I 



■ 



■ • 



mk 



■ ■ 
1 

w 





Class Bp,^' 

Book, jl ?& 

OopigM . 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSin 



PSYCHOLOGY 

— FOR— 

BUSINESS EFFICIENCY 



BY 



GEO. R. EASTMAN, A. B., A. M. 

TEACHER IN STEELE HIGH SCHOOL 
SECRETARY OF THE REX FILM RENOVATOR MFG. CO. 

AUTHOR OF 

PSYCHOLOGY OF SALESMANSHIP 

AND 

PSYCHOLOGY OF ADVERTISING 

(IN PREPARATION) 



Business has increased in efficiency and in honor as a career, 

as it has intelligently employed science and art 

in the solution of its problems 



jfcm 



PUBLISHED BY 

THE SERVICE PUBLISHING COMPANY 

DAYTON, OHIO 






COPYRIGHTED 1916 

BY 

GEO. R. EASTMAN 



JUL 20 1916 



©CI.A433818 



CONTENTS 

FOREWORD Page 

Business Is Concerned with Psychology 9 

PART I 
Processes of Thinking, Feeling and Acting 11-101 

CHAPTER I 
Introduction 

Mental and Physical Processes 17 

Subjective and Objective Realms 19 

Methods of Gaining Psychological Knowledge 19 

Introspection 19 

Experimental Method 20 

Knowledge of Minds of Others . 21 

Mind, Soul, and Spirit . 22 

Definition of Psychology 23 

Classification of Conscious Processes 24 

CHAPTER II 

Conscious Processes and Brain Activity 26 

Habit - 27 

Forming a New Habit 29 

Acquiring Proficiency in a New Line 30 

Efficiency Experts 31 

Replacing Old Habits by New 35 

CHAPTER HI 

Association of Mental Processes 37 

3 



4 CONTENTS 

Association by Contiguity 37 

Process of Acquiring Meaning 39 

Association by Similarity 41 

CHAPTER IV 

Memory 44 

Art of Memorizing 52 

CHAPTER V 

Association Processes in Education 56 

Process of Learning 56 

Meaning or Significance of Things 59 

Learning Aims to Grasp Significance of Things 60 

CHAPTER VI 

Interest and Attention 66 

Practical and Theoretical Interest 67 

Voluntary and Spontaneous Attention 68 

Attention and Feeling 71 

Attention and Salesmanship vr*'. 72 

Attention Directs Mental Processes 77 

CHAPTER VII 

Focus and Margin of Attention 79 

Expectant Attention 80 

CHAPTER VIII 

Acts op Will or Ideo-Motor Activity 83 

Impulsive Acts 84 

Control of Impulse 85 

Acts op Will Involving Deliberation 86 

CHAPTER IX 

Thinking 88 

Test of Truth 96 



CONTENTS 5 

Judgment and Reasoning 99 

Belief and Action 99 

Efficiency and the Aims in Life 100 

PART II 
Factors, Qualities, and Constitution of Consciousness 102-164 

CHAPTER X 
Functions of Consciousness 102 

CHAPTER XI 

Predispositions 108 

Automatic and Reflex Acts 108 

Instincts 108 

Enumeration of Predispositions Ill 

Instincts Require Educational Direction 117 

Modification of Instincts 118 

CHAPTER XII 

Will to Live 123 

Predisposition to Self-Realization 123 

Ideal of Self-Realization 124 

Classes of Instincts 124 

Man Is a Social Being 125 

Meanings of Interest 127 

What Is "An Interest?" 127 

Moral Interest 129 

CHAPTER XIII 

Classification of Interests 132 

Morality— The Major Interest 133 

Philanthropy Interest 135 

Politico -Legal Interest 135 

Family and Home Interest 136 



6 CONTENTS 

Sociability Interest . 137 

Health Interest 137 

Education Interest 138 

Aesthetic Interest 138 

Wealth Interest 139 

Vocation Interest 140 

Work and Need for Recreation 143 

Play Instinct and The Recreation Interest 144 

Recreation Interest „ 146 

Correlation and Co-ordination of Interests... 149 

Temperance and Dissipation 152 

CHAPTER XIV 

Cause, Motive, Purpose, Intention and Effect 153 

Interest, Desire and Aversion 153 

Arousing Desire 155 

Arousing Desire Illustrated by Salesmanship 156 v ' 

Interest, Desire, Value, and Price 158 

Standard of Living 160 

CHAPTER . XV 
Social Service and Welfare Work 161 



PART III 
Factors and Processes of Influencing Behavior 165-260 

CHAPTER XVI 

Suggestion 165 

Typical Ways in Which Behavior Is Influenced 166 

Suggestive Influence on Physiological Processes 167 

Suggestion as a Healing Agent 169 

AUTO-SUGGESTION 173 



CONTENTS 7 

CHAPTER XVII 

Subconscious Induction 176 

Spontaneous Imitation 180 

CHAPTER XVIII 
Fashion, a Type op Intentional Imitation 184 

CHAPTER XIX 

Fads 197 

Fads in Shoes 200 

Intentional Imitation in Tradition and Custom 202 

CHAPTER XX 
Hypnotism 204 

CHAPTER XXI 

Appeal and Solicitation 209 

Making an Appeal Effective 210 

CHAPTER XXII 
Suggestibility and the Ability to Suggest 213 

CHAPTER XXIII 

Belief and Truth 220 

Demonstrated Truth 222 

Fully Reasoned Choice 223 

CHAPTER XXIV 

Rational Suggestion and Rational Imitation 227 

Rational Imitation 227 

Suggestion of Authority 231 



8 CONTENTS 

CHAPTER XXV 

Solicitation 233 

Factors Determining the Response 234 

Corrective Advice 236 

CHAPTER XXVI 
Creating Good Will in Business 238 

CHAPTER XXVII 
Temperamental Qualities, Disposition, and Character 242 

CHAPTER XXVIII 

Developing Character and Personality 246 

Success Depends upon Character 246 

Self- Confidence 249 

Personal Magnetism 251 

Leadership 252 

Efficiency and Success 252 

Personality, the Manifestation of Character 253 

CHAPTER XXIX 

Habit and Adaptability 255 

ProgrEssivism and Conservatism 259 



FOREWORD 

Business and life can not be separated. Business con- 
cerns, and is concerned with all the factors and activi- 
ties of a rightly ordered life. The principles which make 
for business efficiency are the principles which make for 
the efficient life. 

The business man must have knowledge of the material 
factors and processes with which his business is con- 
cerned, and skill in dealing with them. But notable suc- 
cess can be obtained in no line of business, unless one 
knows men, and has skill in influencing them. Skill in 
influencing men comes from knowledge of the mental 
processes and factors which determine the behavior of 
the men. Psychology furnishes this knowledge. 

To become efficient in business one must first deter- 
mine clearly and wisely the end to be gained by the busi- 
ness activity. He must rightly apprehend the best avail- 
able means for attaining the end. He must acquire skill 
in employing the means. He must devote himself reso- 
lutely and unswervingly to the attainment of the end. 

Business is concerned with rendering service to meet 
the needs and satisfy the interests of men. What is in- 
volved in rendering such service and the nature and func- 
tion of needs and interests, will appear later on. 

The final end, or aim, of business activities is to bring 
about a mutually advantageous exchange of services, or 

9 



10 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

of serviceable things. In this exchange, a fair amount 
of money, or of some other means of securing service, 
or some form of service is received in return for the ser- 
vice, or the serviceable thing offered in the exchange. 

After one has clearly grasped the end of business ac- 
tivities the next essential is to master the means of at- 
taining it. One must gain a clear understanding of the 
character and interrelations of the various factors which 
must be dealt with in rendering service. Efficiency de- 
mands that one have the knowledge and skill which en- 
able him to deal with these factors in the most advan- 
tageous way. The most advantageous or efficient way 
is the way which involves the least expenditure of time, 
effort, and material resources. 

Business is concerned largely with the properties of 
material things, with mechanical, industrial, and financial 
problems. This book has nothing to do with these mat- 
ters, except insofar as they are involved in correlations 
with mental processes. 

This discussion has to do only with the human ele- 
ment in business. It has to do with this element only 
as mental predispositions and processes become factors 
in business affairs. „ 

The activities, or behavior, of men enter directly or 
indirectly into every step of the processes which promote 
or hinder the attainment of business success. Mental 
processes determine human behavior, which is ever pres- 
ent as a factor making for the success or failure of busi- 
ness activities. 

The greatest problem in attaining business efficiency 



FOREWORD 11 

is not concerned with the qualities of material things, 
or with mechanical, industrial, or financial processes. The 
problems of money, raw materials, machinery and finance 
are comparatively easy to solve. Yet experience has 
shown that it pays to employ well-trained men to deal 
with these matters. 

The most important, complex and difficult problems of 
the business world are the problems of developing honest, 
loyal and capable men, and of directing their activities so 
as to get the best service they are capable of rendering. 
The problems of dealing with men are difficult because 
they involve dealing with the intangible and subtle men- 
tal predispositions and processes which determine their 
behavior. 

The business world has long known that the problems 
of engineering, or of the various professions, can be 
solved only by one who has spent the time and effort 
required to master the various sciences which deal with 
the problems. Business men are just awakening to the 
fact that the science of human behavior can afford them 
assistance in solving the problems involved in dealing 
with men. 

BUSINESS IS CONCERNED WITH PSYCHOLOGY 

Business is engaged in supplying commodities to sat- 
isfy the needs of men, or in rendering other service to 
them. It is as vitally concerned with a knowledge of 
the needs and interests it serves, as it is with a knowledge 
of the material things it employs in rendering service. 
The business man should understand the processes that 



12 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

go on in the minds of the men with whom he transacts 
business. 

Efficiency in transacting business requires that one 
observe, learn, remember, think, form habits, exercise 
will power, influence the actions of others, etc. In order 
to have skill in influencing men one must have knowl- 
edge of the mental processes, the predispositions, and 
qualities of character which determine the course of their 
thinking, feeling, and acting. Psychology is the science 
which gives an understanding of these things. 

One should have psychological knowledge to improve 
the working of his own mind. He should have this 
knowledge to increase his skill in dealing with the men- 
tal processes of others. Without psychological knowl- 
edge one can not be efficient in directing the activities of 
other men. Knowledge of the nature and working of 
the human mind, and understanding of the processes of 
influencing it, and skill in exercising this influence, are 
necessary parts of the equipment of the efficient business 
man. He must know the established truths of psychol- 
ogy which have a practical application in business affairs. 
Psychological knowledge supplies a large part of the 
foundation on which the science of business efficiency 
must be built. 

If these statements are true, it must be evident that 
every successful business man must have acquired a con- 
siderable amount of psychological knowledge. While this 
is the case, it is also true that the psychological knowl- 
edge of the average man, who has not studied psychology, 



FOREWORD 13 

is not as clear, comprehensive, and well organized as it 
should be, to give it the greatest usefulness. 

One who has never studied a systematic work on psy- 
chology has some insight into many psychological pro- 
cesses. He knows in a general way what is meant by 
habit, memory, attention, interest, desire, decision, etc., 
but as he studies psychology he will find that his knowl- 
edge of these subjects is vague and inadequate. As one's 
understanding of the general principles which explain 
the mind's activities becomes more certain and accurate, 
his efficiency in business should increase. One can deal 
more effectively with mental processes, when he sees 
clearly what they are, and how they work. His more 
exact and better organized knowledge will help him in 
understanding and influencing the minds of the men with 
whom he deals. It is now recognized that in business, 
as in education, we should turn to psychology as a science 
dealing with matters of fundamental importance. 

Many business men have long felt that a study of psy- 
chology should be of practical help to them. When they 
have taken up the standard works on the subject, they have 
found that the analyses and theoretical explanations, were 
involved in abstruse technicalities, and included much 
that did not seem to be practically helpful. The writers 
not only furnished no clue as to where or how to apply 
the principles in business practice, but also failed to make 
clear what could be used. As a matter of fact the ordin- 
ary psychological treatise contains much matter which 
can not be helpfully applied in practical business affairs. 

A few psychological tid-bits have been included in the 



14 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

treatises aimed to give instruction in salesmanship and 
advertising. They have aroused the appetite of the read- 
ers for more psychology. A few psychological mono- 
graphs and special articles by psychologists have been put 
forth to meet the demand thus aroused. However, the 
appetite aroused by the tempting samples has not always 
proved a sufficient stimulus to insure proper digestion and 
assimilation of these contributions. Some of the current 
courses in salesmanship and advertising, along with much 
valuable practical knowledge, and some sound psychol- 
ogy, also contain many vagaries about the subjective and 
objective mind, and other matters which leave the reader 
groping in the dim obscurity of the labarynthine maze of 
the subconscious, which entangles even those who have 
gone somewhat deeply into psychology. 

In psychology, as in other matters, "A little learning 
is a dangerous thing." Isolated fragments of psycho- 
logical knowledge are likely to be misinterpreted and 
misapplied, when not viewed in proper relation to other 
psychological principles. One needs a foundation, or 
apperception basis, consisting of a knowledge of general 
psychology, in order to view in the right perspective and 
properly apply the psychological principles which are 
practically helpful in business. Our aim is to give such 
a general survey of the whole subject as will enable one 
to see the part clearly, both as a part, and as a member of 
the whole. 

The crudely formulated and sketchy psychological 
knowledge of common sense will no longer meet the de- 
mands of modern business. Many men, realize this, and 



FOREWORD 15 

have been looking to psychology for assistance; but the 
treatises on psychology at present available are not well 
adapted to meet their needs. The business man resorts 
to psychology for an explanation of human conduct, such 
as will be helpful in guiding him to understanding and 
influencing the men with whom he deals. He not only 
wishes to master the principles in accordance with which 
conduct can be influenced, but he also wishes to get a 
clear understanding of the principles in accordance with 
which he can develop in himself the ability to exert such 
influence. 

The business man is concerned chiefly with the part of 
psychology which deals with the processes by which we 
get our ideas and beliefs, and with the nature of the im- 
pulses and motives which determine human conduct, and 
the principles in accordance with which the conduct of 
one man is controlled or influenced by another. The cur- 
rent psychological treatises have given too little attention 
to these subjects, have included much which has no bear- 
ing on them, and have failed to make practically helpful 
the parts which are pertinent to them. 

Most of the work of competent psychologists very prop- 
erly has aimed to develop psychology as a science. They 
have sought to increase human knowledge as a means of 
satisfying the interest in knowing. They have been con- 
cerned with the establishing of the broad genera) prin- 
ciples of the science, rather than with showing how these 
principles may be applied to guide one helpfully in deal- 
ing with practical affairs. The present work deals with 
the principles and factors manifested in thinking, feeling, 



16 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

and acting, and with the methods in accordance with 
which this knowledge may be made practically useful in 
satisfying interests in life other than the scientific inter- 
est, or interest in knowing. 



PART I 

PROCESSES OF THINKING, FEELING AND ACTING 

CHAPTER I 
INTRODUCTION 

MENTAL AND PHYSICAL PROCESSES 

One is helped to understand mental processes by mak- 
ing an effort to distinguish between mental and physical 
processes. 

Think about your brain! The brain is a material ob- 
ject. It is similar to the various other objects of the 
physical or objective world. It can be weighed in ounces 
and measured in cubic inches. It fills a definite amount 
of space in the skull. Another material object can not 
be put in the space occupied by the brain without dis- 
placing and injuring it. Under certain conditions the 
brain can be observed by many different minds at the 
same time, or by the same mind at different times. 

Now think about the thing which thinks about your 
brain. This is the mind. By the mind, we mean the 
predispositions and processes manifested in the conscious- 
ness of the thinker. 

Conscious processes do not fill space or have weight. 
The head is no fuller and the person is no heavier, when 
he is thinking of a ton of coal, than when he is not think- 

17 



18 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ing at all. Mental processes are closely associated with 
physical processes. But the mind is not in the brain or 
head as the seed is in the pumpkin. 

As far as our observation reveals, the inanimate ob- 
jects of the physical world are not aware of their exist- 
ence, or of what is happening to them. We have no 
direct knowledge of their inner nature. What this nature 
is, is a matter for metaphysical inference rather than 
psychological consideration. 

In the brain, and in other living things, are manifested 
certain vital processes. The inner nature of these pro- 
cesses is also clearly beyond our power of direct obser- 
vation. Our conception of them must be arrived at by 
inference from the activities observed. 

Mental processes are conscious of being mental pro- 
cesses. In the lowest, or least developed, forms of con- 
scious existence, the consciousness must be extremely 
vague and diffused. It probably takes the form of a 
feebly felt striving. Some philosophers hold that the in- 
animate and vital forces, referred to above, are essentially 
of this character. 

In the mental processes, with which we are concerned 
in this book, the mind does not merely think and feel and 
will; it knows that it does so. The conscious processes 
are self-conscious. The ability to observe and classify 
and understand the function of mental processes has been 
developed. These conscious processes can be known di- 
rectly to one person only, and that person is the one in 
whose mind they occur. 



INTRODUCTION 19 

SUBJECTIVE AND OBJECTIVE REALMS 

The things of which we have experience, but which 
exist independently of our experience of them, are known 
as objects of experience. They make up what is known 
as the objective world. Our conscious experiences of 
external objects are said to be subjective. Our thought, 
or idea, of another person, or of a material object, is sub- 
jective, but the person or house is objective. 

METHODS OF GAINING PSYCHOLOGICAL KNOWLEDGE 
INTROSPECTION 

One can get a direct or first hand knowledge of men- 
tal facts, only by looking into his own mind and seeing 
what is going on there. This act of observing the pro- 
cesses of one's own mind is known as introspection. In- 
trospection means looking within. Introspection is the 
study of one's conscious experience. 

Progress in the knowledge of the workings of mental 
processes would be very slow, if one had to rely solely 
on the results of his own introspection. In psychological 
literature one finds accumulated the knowledge gained 
by the efforts of the best observers and thinkers of count- 
less generations of men. Psychologists have gathered the 
general conclusions from this wide range of observation 
and experience. They have arranged and classified these 
observations and have formulated general principles. 
They have tested the truthfulness of these general prin- 
ciples by applying them to experience to see whether they 



20 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

work satisfactorily in furnishing guidance in dealing with 
experience. 

Reading, alone, will not make a good psychologist, any 
more than it will make a good physician. A book can 
only serve as a guide in pointing out what to look for, 
where to find it, and what its signficance is. 

If one is to acquire useful psychological knowledge, he 
must become interested and skillful in observing what 
goes on in his own mind. One has not mastered the gen- 
eral principles of this book well enough to make them 
practically helpful in ordering the affairs of his own life, 
or in dealing with men, until he can illustrate them with 
elements of his own experience other than those given. 

One has not mastered a thing until he can apply it 
successfully. An attempt at application reveals whether 
one has adequately understood the principle. It is also 
an efficient method of learning. If one can not verify in 
his own experience the truthfulness of the general prin- 
ciples explained here, and make other applications of 
them, he has not adequately grasped them. 

EXPERIMENTAL METHOD 

Ways have been devised for studying certain mental 
processes experimentally. By using the apparatus and 
complying with the directions of the original experi- 
menter, the processes under observation may be repro- 
duced as often as desired, under conditions which free 
them, to a greater or less extent, from confusing or dis- 
tracting factors. 



INTRODUCTION 21 

KNOWLEDGE OF THE MINDS OF OTHERS 

Psychology assumes that the minds of all men work 
according to the same laws. It also assumes that con- 
scious processes and behavior are similarly correlated in 
all persons. Such correlation means that in all persons 
the same conscious processes are manifested by the same 
forms of expression and behavior. It also means that 
similar expression and behavior may be assumed to have 
resulted from similar conscious processes. 

We can not directly observe what is going on in the 
minds of others. The mental processes of another can 
only be inferred from what he says, and from the ex- 
pression of his countenance, and the tone and manner 
of saying it; from what he does and his manner of do- 
ing it. 

In saying that we know the minds of others only by 
inference, we do not mean that we must discriminate the 
significant expressive elements in the total impression, and 
center attention on them, and make explicit inferences 
from them. 

The ability to understand feelings and motives is large- 
ly instinctive. One who did not have, at least, such an 
innate capacity, which could be developed readily in ex- 
perience, would not get along well with his fellows. 

Although we have this instinctive basis for understand- 
ing feelings and motives, our ability to apprehend them 
can be improved greatly by proper effort. The improve- 
ment in ability comes through wide experience which is 
carefully assimilated. We learn to apprehend feelings 



22 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

and volitions manifested by expressive symbols, as read- 
ily as we grasp thoughts expressed by verbal symbols. 
Our attention is not directed to the symbol in either case. 
These symbols, which are significant expressions of the 
mental processes of others, can be interpreted rightly only 
as one, as the result of accurate introspection, has a cor- 
rect knowledge of the processes of his own mind which 
have the forms of expression he observes in others. 

Much of the time of the business man is spent in try- 
ing to interpret the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of 
other men. In this, one must be guided by their acts and 
expression, and by what they say. We assume that, if 
they are truthful, they have the same mental state we 
would have, if we expressed it in the same terms. 

But sometimes men do not tell the truth, or are mis- 
taken about their own state of mind. They may say 
they are calm, when they are excited or angry. Hence 
we judge people not merely by what they say, but by 
how they say it, by what they do, by their attitude and 
involuntary movements, and by the expression of their 
faces. 

Understanding of one's own mind must come first. 
Through this understanding one can gain insight into 
the interplay of forces in the minds of others, and plan 
the best ways to influence them by bringing about suit- 
able processes in their minds. 

MIND, SOUL, AND SPIRIT 

Mind, as the term is used in psychology, includes all 
the mental predispositions and all the processes of think- 



INTRODUCTION 23 

ing, feeling and willing that manifest themselves in con- 
sciousness. The mind is the personal, conscious agent 
that thinks, and feels, and forms purposes, and strives to 
realize them. This agent is the thing referred to when 
we speak about our soul or spirit. All that we can know 
directly about our soul or spirit is gained by studying 
the mental processes manifested in conscious experience. 
The terms soul and spirit have metaphysical or reli- 
gious implications which the term mind does not involve. 
Soul and spirit, as applied to the mind, generally imply 
that it is capable of existing apart from the body after 
its death, as an individual being with thoughts, feelings 
and volitions organized as a conscious personality. Such 
a belief in the mind's immortality is not based upon direct 
psychological observations, but upon religious revelation, 
or on metaphysical reasoning proceeding from the ob- 
served facts of the subjective and objective worlds. 

DEFINITION OF PSYCHOLOGY 

Psychology is the study of the conscious processes and 
mental predispositions manifested in behavior. The 
knowledge of the predispositions and processes, such as 
instincts, interests, habits, association, memory, attention, 
etc., which are common to all minds is known as Gen- 
eral Psychology. 

Social Psychology studies the processes which involve 
the co-operation of two or more individuals. Under this 
definition this book contains considerable social psy- 
chology. Under it, the Psychology of Business Efficiency, 
Salesmanship and Advertising are largely social psychol- 



24 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ogy. But the understanding of them involves the under- 
standing of certain processes studied in General and In- 
dividual Psychology. 

Individual psychology undertakes to determine how 
individuals vary in native endowment, and how their 
peculiar endowments have determined their development. 

Our aim in studying conscious processes and factors 
is to make clear how they are manifested in and deter- 
mine the behavior of men. 

CLASSIFICATION OF CONSCIOUS PROCESSES 

Conscious processes have three distinguishable aspects 
knowm as thinking, feeling and willing. 

The processes of knowing about things are studied in 
psychology under the headings : sensation, perception, 
conception, association, memory, apperception, judgment 
and reasoning. It is unnecessary, for the attainment of 
our purpose, to undertake an elaborate technical treat- 
ment of some of these subjects, such as has made up a 
large part of traditional psychology. 

In sensation and perception we get a knowledge of our 
own bodies and of the external world. We may distin- 
guish a mere sensation of warmth, cold, light, color, 
sound, touch, taste, smell, pressure, muscular strain, or 
motion, without referring it to any particular object. But 
when we are aware of a warm object, or moving object, 
or colored object, we are said to have a perception of 
the object. 

We can distinguish a sensation of red. But we 
have a perception of a red apple. In the perception 



INTRODUCTION 25 

tion of redness, we attribute to it various qualities as 
roundness, smoothness, weight, taste, odor, edibility, etc., 
which our previous experience has taught us are pos- 
sessed by the apple. 



CHAPTER II 

CONSCIOUS PROCESSES AND BRAIN ACTIVITY 

The processes of the mind are accompanied by and 
depend upon brain activity. An increase of mental activ- 
ity involves a similar increase of brain activity. The in- 
creased brain activity causes a more rapid consumption 
of the nourishment furnished to the brain cells by the 
blood circulating among them. The blood which sup- 
plies the energy must also remove the poisonous waste 
products resulting from the activity. Various organs of 
the body, such as those of digestion and assimilation and 
the liver, kidneys and lungs, are involved in supplying 
nourishment to the blood, or eliminating waste materials 
from it. Hence the efficiency of mental processes varies 
with the way the various organs of the body are perform- 
ing their functions of supplying nourishment and elimin- 
ating waste materials. Hence the old saying: "A sound 
mind in a sound body." 

An efficient mind must have an efficient body as its 
servant. To attain this end one must take proper food, 
exercise, recreation, rest, etc. 

Excessive exercise or too much manual labor leaves lit- 
tle energy for vigorous, protracted mental activity. Loss 
of sleep prevents proper nourishment and removal of 
waste matters. It also causes a temporary loss of weight, 

26 



Conscious Processes and Brain Activity 27 

with a corresponding decrease in the amount of energy 
available. One must avoid these things, if he is to be 
fresh, vigorous, enduring, and efficient in the mental work 
which modern business requires. 

habit 

When one first undertakes to perform a new act which 
is complicated or requires special skill, his efforts are 
hesitating, awkward, and groping. Movements that are 
bungling and ill-suited to the purpose are mingled with 
those properly directed. The well-directed movements 
are noted with satisfaction. An effort is made to repeat 
them and to check the ill-suited movements. 

With practice, the movements gradually become bet- 
ter co-ordinated and easier to perform. Painstaking 
effort, faithfully persisted in, develops skill; Finally the 
whole complicated process is running smoothly. It runs 
along almost without conscious supervision, while atten- 
tion is directed to other things. Complicated acts, which 
at first required careful thought and effort to perform 
them at all, come at last practically to repeat themselves. 
To all intents and purposes they have become automatic. 

Acts which through practice have come to be prac- 
tically automatic are called habits. Thus we have learned 
to walk, to eat, to talk, to read and write, to sing or play, 
or run a typewriter, or do the countless other familiar 
acts with which our lives are so largely filled. 

The explanation of habit is largely physiological, rather 
than psychological. The tissues of the brain are plastic. 
Plasticity means that the brain cells are modified by, and 



28 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

permanently retain the effects of the activity which takes 
place in them. Nervous impulses, or currents of nerve 
activity, are aroused in the organs of sensation such as 
the eye, ear, or hand. They pass along the nerve to the 
brain. They go through the brain, and then pass out 
through another set of nerves, to control muscular activ- 
ity. In so doing, they leave an effect on the nerve cells. 
They establish a path, or course, that other impulses will 
tend to follow. 

While these courses are being developed, conscious 
supervision, guidance, and effort are necessary in per- 
forming the acts. When the pathway of nervous dis- 
charge has been definitely established, the impulse fol- 
lows it without guidance. The switches are set for the 
impulses in the nervous tissue to pass along the right 
track. The organism has gained the ability to perform 
acts which originally required conscious supervision. It 
performs them more quickly, and more accurately, and 
with less fatigue. 

Many hold that the mind is an important factor in 
directing habitual acts, but that it functions in so slightly 
conscious a form that we can scarcely notice it, or do not 
notice it at all. The mind as well as the brain has been 
modified by past functioning so that it has acquired dis- 
positions toward the performance of certain processes. 
Such functioning of the mind is called sub-conscious. 

In forming habits, the mind and brain have been 
moulded by practice. Stereotyped forms have been taken 
on by means of which many of the routine acts of life 
may be economically performed. The lessons of experi- 



HABIT 29 

ence are thus registered in habitual ways of thinking, 
feeling, and acting about things. Familiar acts thus come 
practically to perform themselves, while the attention and 
intellect are left free to grapple with new problems and 
situations which arise. This makes clear the importance 
of rendering habitual the routine acts of life. 

FORMING A NEW HABIT 

The movements, or procedure, involved in forming a 
new habit may be learned by the method of trial and 
error, or by imitation of others. 

When the right procedure, or combination of move- 
ments, has been apprehended, the factors which make 
for success in forming the habit are: 

1. Concentration of attention on the task. 

2. Careful rehearsal, or repetition. 

3. The avoidance of lapses into another procedure 
until the habit has been firmly established. 

With the formation of the habit, there develops a pro- 
pensity to do the thing in the way being made habitual. 
The habitual way grows to be the pleasant way. A de- 
parture from it becomes unpleasant. One should make a 
strong resolve to form the new habit. He should hold in 
mind the satisfactory consequences which will result from 
forming the new habit, and the unsatisfactory conse- 
quences which will result from failure. If the new habit 
is to displace a firmly established old habit, one should 
resolutely turn his thoughts from the old habit by keep- 
ing them directed resolutely on the task of forming the 
new one. Allowing the attention to dwell on the old 



30 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

habit develops a tendency to perform it which is hard to 
resist. 

ACQUIRING PROFICIENCY IN A NEW UNE 

When a man takes up a new line of work, his general 
education and experience enable him to make rapid prog- 
ress at first. Improvement is rapid at first, because the 
steps of progress are made largely by merely using old 
habits and previously acquired skill and knowledge, and 
reorganizing them and adapting them to new uses. 

When these easy steps have been made, and when fur- 
ther advance depends mainly on acquiring new habits, 
progress becomes slow and difficult. The enthusiasm re- 
sulting from the novelty of the work fades away. For 
a time one seems to make no advance in skill. He may 
even become less successful in the performance. He has 
reached what is known as a plateau in habit formation. 

When a plateau of arrested progress has been reached, 
the faint-hearted often become discouraged and quit. 
However, the knowledge that their experience is a nor- 
mal one, should give them resolution to keep on. When 
a plateau has been reached, further progress depends 
mainly on the ability to hold one's self to the task by 
sheer force of will, until the new knowledge is assimilated, 
the new habits are formed, and the new skill is developed. 
Finally another stage of rapid progress will be entered 
upon, and may continue for some time, before another 
plateau is reached and another stage of arrested progress 
must be worked through. 



EFFICIENCY EXPERTS 31 

EFFICIENCY EXPERTS 

The business of the efficiency experts, of whom we have 
heard so much of late, has been to study and improve 
habits of doing things in the various lines of industrial 
work and business management. The present interest in 
this line of work was aroused by the achievement of a 
young college man placed in charge of a gang of men 
shoveling dirt. By timing each movement, and study- 
ing its form, and comparing one man's method of work- 
ing with that of another, he found that they were mak- 
ing some unnecessary movements, and other motions with 
the wrong speed. He thought out the best way of doing 
the work. He determined the size of shovel and the 
weight of the shovelful which could be handled with the 
best results. He taught his best workman what motions 
he should make, in what order and with what speed. He 
offered him increased pay for mastering the best form 
and doing more work. Soon this man was doing more 
than twice the work of the others, without getting more 
tired than formerly. Soon the others were taught the 
new way of working with the result that their earnings 
were increased and the work was done at a greatly re- 
duced cost. 

The movement thus started has spread to many lines 
of mechanical industry and business. Offices and fac- 
tories have been rearranged to get better light, heat and 
ventilation, and safer and more convenient conditions of 
work. Machines have been replaced, tools have been im- 
proved and rearranged. All this has brought good re- 



32 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

suits. But more unexpected and more profitable have 
been the improvements found possible in the old habits 
of doing things. To give another example, the move- 
ments used in laying brick were changed in kind and 
order, and reduced in number from eighteen to five. This 
increased the wages and the amount of work done and 
lowered the cost to the builder. 

The efficiently trained business man will have an equally 
great advantage over the inefficient. He should take the 
attitude of the efficiency expert toward his own way of 
doing things. He should become a specialist, working 
and planning with the one idea in mind. Specialization 
of function and concentration of effort go hand in hand 
with development of marked efficiency in every vocation. 
As long as the same man was both barber and surgeon 
he was highly efficient in neither line. 

One of the first principles of efficiency is to make a 
careful record of present attainment. This shows where 
improvement can be made and is a basis on which im- 
provement can be measured. 

The efficiency engineer, working in industrial lines, 
makes careful time and motion studies of various pro- 
cesses. He finds, perhaps, that production may be in- 
creased by reducing the number of motions, or by in- 
creasing their speed, or by substituting new motions, etc. 
By careful study he fixes upon standards for the employ- 
ment of the time of the men, of materials and of equip- 
ment. He supplies incentives to induce men to perfect 
themselves along approved lines. 

Improvements, even in the methods of complicated 



EFFICIENCY EXPERTS 33 

business affairs, may be made by the haphazard and 
bungling method of trial and error and the selection of 
lucky strikes. But there is no assurance that the desired 
results will be gained by "going it blind." Such advan- 
tages as are gained are likely to be costly. This method 
contrasts strongly with that of the efficiency expert. 

One may gain considerable skill in the art of doing a 
thing by blindly imitating the methods of others. Such 
skill is not clarified by knowledge of the general prin- 
ciples which make clear the reason why the thing is done 
in that particular way. One has no assurance that the 
acquired way is the best way. His knowledge extends 
no farther than his skill. 

Knowledge and skill so acquired and limited can afford 
satisfactory guidance only in cases easily recognized as 
similar to those of past experience. They can not be 
applied under conditions materially different from those 
in which one has learned to apply them. They are not 
readily transferable and adaptable to a different situation. 

One who has learned by the method of trial and error, 
or by blind imitation, may not be able to perceive the cir- 
cumstances which alter the cases. Even if he perceives 
the new conditions, he can adopt his knowledge and skill 
to the requirements of the altered circumstances, only by 
more of the process of imitation, or of selecting from 
among the misses the lucky hits made by efforts which 
lack the guiding light of intelligence. One who gains 
success by this method is still lacking in the knowledge 
why one attempt succeeded and the others failed. 

One who has previously acquired the knowledge which 



34 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

enables him to explain the whys and wherefores of suc- 
cess and failure, has a good chance of being able to select 
the right course of procedure at first. One so prepared 
can forecast, more or less accurately, the consequences 
of the various lines of effort as they occur to him. He 
can thus avoid much wasteful bungling. 

The business of the efficiency expert is to apply exact, 
or scientific, knowledge and methods to the solution of 
business problems. He determines the aim to be realized 
by the business activities. He locates and defines the 
problems involved in realizing the aim in the best avail- 
able way. 

The most efficient way is the way which requires the 
least expenditure of time, energy, and material resources. 
When this way has been clearly determined, one who 
wishes to become proficient in it, should at first go 
through the process slowly, aiming at right ordering of 
processes and accuracy in every part. When perfect 
form has been acquired, one can then attain speed by 
careful and attentive practice. 

One who wishes to become efficient should study his 
habits of using and wasting time. He must so arrange 
matters that a proper amount of time will be given to 
work, recreation, rest, etc. He should then hold him- 
self rigorously to the wise employment of his time. He 
should develop regular habits of working, resting and 
taking recreation in due proportion. 

The efficient man will have initiative. Initiative means 
ability to discover what is demanded, and wisdom in 
choosing and skill in using the best means and processes 



REPLACING OLD HABITS 35 

to attain it. He will also have a predisposition to do 
these things without waiting to be told to do so. 

REPLACING OLD HABITS BY NEW HABITS 

The law of habit applies to every mental act and to 
every trait of character. Each step in our development 
involves the formation of a new habit. When you wish 
to break up a bad habit, substitute a good one for it. 
Whatever can be avoided under the notion that it is bad, 
can also be avoided by centering attention on the idea 
that something else is good, and forming a habit along 
the more desirable line. One may avoid drunkenness be- 
cause he fears he may develop poor digestion, a torpid 
liver, shattered nerves, blunted feelings, and wreck his 
home and business and lose the respect of his associates. 
This will be an effective motive. But the effect will be 
more wholesome if he dwells mainly on the attractiveness 
of sobriety as bringing a happy family, desirable friends, 
success in business, and a worthy place in the esteem of 
the community. But this in itself will not break up the 
vicious habit. One must not only cultivate aversion to 
the vicious and enthusiasm for the virtuous act, but he 
must also form a habit of acting virtuously. 

To develop a new habit, start with determination and 
vigor to do the act. Improve every opportunity to prac- 
tice it. Make no exceptions in favor of the old habit. 
One brief lapse into the old way will sweep away much 
that has been gained by long and painstaking efforts 
and will greatly increase the chance of future lapses. 
Banish the old habit from your mind by keeping your 



36 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

thoughts fixed on the new habit. Keeping the old habit 
in mind develops an impulse to perform it, as will be 
explained later under will and suggestion. 

Our nervous tissues are plastic in youth but become 
less easily molded as we grow older. Under twenty is 
the time to fix right personal habits of eating, exercise, 
neatness in dress, well modulated speech, ease in inter- 
course with others, etc. Between twenty and thirty is the 
age best adapted to forming intellectual and professional 
habits. 

Everyone should realize early in life that he is to work 
out his own fate. Whether he is a failure or success 
depends largely on the habits he forms. We easily be- 
come slaves to bad habits, or to poorly formed habits. 
The hell hereafter is nothing compared to the hell we 
can make for ourselves here, by developing wrong habits. 
Habit gets one into a rut. We grow to like habitual 
ways of doing things. Constant self-criticism alone can 
tell one whether his ruts are carrying him out of the 
lines of progress and of greatest efficiency. We should 
endeavor to discover the most efficient ways of doing the 
routine matters of our business and to make them habit- 
ual as soon as possible. Our attention can then be con- 
centrated on the important problems clamoring daily for 
solution.* 



*The discussion of habit will be continued under the topic 
"Developing Character and Personality." Chapter XXVIII. 



CHAPTER III 

ASSOCIATION OF MENTAL PROCESSES 

The effect that the presentation of a business proposi- 
tion has on the man to whom it is addressed depends on 
the processes of thinking, feeling, and acting aroused in 
his mind by the suggestions and arguments used. The 
directions these processes take depends largely on the 
habits and associations he has previously formed. 

ASSOCIATION BY CONTIGUITY 

To make clear what is meant by association by con- 
tiguity, think of the word stock for a few moments ; and 
then notice what follows it in your mind. The word 
stock may suggest to you the goods in a store, the paper 
representing a financial interest in some corporation, the 
raw materials from which something is to be manufac- 
tured, or a part of a gun, or a thing to wear round your 
neck, or the stock from which a cook makes soup. 

A merchant would be more likely to think of the goods 
in the store, a broker of the stock certificate, a farmer of 
the animals, a haberdasher of the thing to wear round 
your neck, a cook of the soup stock. This is explained 
by the fact that each man has formed a habit of going in 
thought from the one idea to the other. When such 
an habitual connection has been established between 
thoughts, they are said to be associated by contiguity. 

37 



38 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

The principle we are now considering is often called 
the law of the association of ideas by contiguity. But in 
using the word idea, we should bear in mind that an idea 
is a process of thinking about a thing. We should also 
remember that an idea may become associated with a 
feeling and with the impulse to action aroused by the 
feeling. 

For example, if one has become ill from eating an arti- 
cle of food he has previously liked, the thought of the 
article may thereafter arouse in his mind a feeling of dis- 
gust with its volitional tendency to avoid eating it. 

Suppose that a customer has been offended by a sales- 
man, or even unjustly feels angry at him, or dislikes him 
for any reason whatever. The feeling of dislike, or the 
ill-will aroused is likely to become associated with the 
store in the mind of the customer. If such an associa- 
tion becomes established, the thought of the store is likely 
to arouse in the customer's mind the feeling of dislike or 
ill-will experienced in the store. The customer hence- 
forth feels ill-will for the store. Dissatisfaction with the 
merchandise or service of the store, or dislike for its fit- 
tings or general appearance, tends in a similar way to 
create ill-will. 

On the other hand a courteous efficient salesman who 
has regard for the real interests of the customer will in- 
spire a feeling of good will which will become associated 
with the thought of the business he represents. A store 
can also create good-will by making a favorable impres- 
sion through its artistic fittings and decorations, its clean- 
liness and the conveniences furnished for the use of the 



ASSOCIATION BY CONTIGUITY 39 

customers, etc. Whatever pleases or satisfies the cus- 
tomer tends to create good-will.* 

The thought of the store is much more likely to revive 
the feeling of ill-will or good-will associated with it, than 
the presence of the feeling in consciousness is likely to 
arouse the idea of the store. One tends to pass more 
readily from the processes of thinking to the processes of 
feeling associated with them than vice versa. 

The following statement of the law of association by 
contiguity includes processes of feeling and willing, as 
well as processes of thinking. 

If two processes have been in consciousness together, 
or in immediate succession, the reappearance of one of 
them tends to recall the other. 

PROCESS OF ACQUIRING MEANING 

Things gain meaning through the process of associa- 
tion. A thing has taken on meaning when the conse- 
quences we experience in dealing with it in certain ways 
have become associated with the idea of the thing. Edu- 
cation is largely a process of taking on such meaningful 
associations. The reader should recall how certain sen- 
sations develop into the perception of an apple. The 
ideas which give meaning to the notion of an apple are 
memories of past experiences, of feeling, seeing, tast- 
ing, etc., derived from dealing with things which have 
the properties found in apples. 

*See Chapter XXVI. This subject will be developed more 
fully in Chapter V, also in Part II. For a more extended dis- 
cussion see "Psychology of Salesmanship" and "Psychology of 
Advertising." Published by The Service Publishing Co., Dayton, 
Ohio. 



40 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

The process of acquirng meaning, is the process of 
forming meaningful associations. A thing has meaning 
when the idea of it suggests that it has properties which 
make it capable of affecting our consciousness in certain 
anticipated ways. The meaning is the preperception, or 
anticipation, of the further experiencing with the object. 
It is a reappearance of a previous experience in con- 
sciousness, to serve as a guide in subsequent experience. 
Meaning is the memory of previous experience serving 
as an anticipation of future experience. The "Process of 
Acquiring Meaning" will be understood better after read- 
ing the discussion of the "Meaning, or Significance of 
Things" and "Learning Aims to Grasp the Significance 
of Things" following the "Art of Memorizing." 

The qualities which give significance or meaning to 
objects are the qualities which concern the satisfaction 
of our powers of feeling and striving which are mani- 
festations of our instincts or interests. In aiming to in- 
fluence a person, one endeavors to select and present to 
him qualities or characteristics, or relations between 
things, in such a way that he will recognize the things 
as standing in significant relations to his needs or inter- 
ests. The aim is to select certain qualities of stimulus 
and to correlate them with certain qualities in the men- 
tal constitution of the person. The endeavor is to bring 
qualities of the object into relation to the aims or pur- 
poses which express qualities of the subject.* 

*See discussion of ''Well-being or Self-realization." Chap- 
ter XIII. 



ASSOCIATION 41 

ASSOCIATION BY SIMILARITY 

If one disregards the spelling of the word "stock" and 
centers attention on the sound, it may suggest the word 
"stalk" having a similar pronunciation but a different 
meaning. This illustrates association by similarity. The 
law is as follows: A process of thinking tends to sug- 
gest similar processes of thinking. A process of feeling 
does not in the same way suggest similar processes of 
feeling. A process of feeling tends rather to bring it 
about that the ideas accompanying the feeling will sug- 
gest ideas which have a tendency to arouse a similar pro- 
cess of feeling. This will become clear in the discussion 
of emotional congruity as a factor in association. 

The following illustrations will help to bring out the 
difference between association by contiguity and asso- 
ciation by similarity. If one thinks of the moon, some 
idea previously thought of in connection with the moon 
may next come into mind, in accordance with the prin- 
ciple of contiguity. One may thus think of "green 
cheese" or of something he did on a moonlight night, 
or of some fact he knows about the moon. 

If the attention is focused on the brightness of the 
moon, one may next think of the sun, or of a light, or 
of some other bright object. If the attention is directed 
to the spherical shape of the moon, one may next think 
of a ball, or of some other object of similar form. If 
the attention is centered on any aspect, quality, or char- 
acteristic of an object, he may be led by association to 
think of any other object which has the same aspect, 
quality or characteristic, no matter how unlike the two 
objects may be in other respects. 



42 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

Any object may suggest any other object which 
resembles it in any respect, provided the attention 
is focused on the quality in which the two objects 
resemble each other. The similarity may be com- 
monplace and evident, or far-fetched and fanciful, 
as in poetry. The similarity may be one of abstract re- 
lations and difficult to perceive. 

Newton reasoned that the moon, instead of moving 
around the earth, would pass off into space in a straight 
line, if it were not continuously attracted to the earth. 
He noticed the similarity in relations between the moon 
drawn continuously toward the earth and the unsupported 
apple falling to the earth. By assuming that the force 
which holds the moon in its orbit is the same as the force 
which causes the apple to fall, Newton was able to dem- 
onstrate that the motions of all the bodies in the universe 
conform to the law of gravitation. He proved the uni- 
versality of the law of gravitation. 

The great inventor is the person who sees similarity 
of relations which escape the notice of others. The great 
poets and artists and leaders in thought, the great cap- 
tains of industry, in short, the geniuses in every line have 
minds, unusually fertile in association by similarity. For- 
tunate is he who can see the resemblances of things. 

Any idea you present to a man may arouse in his mind, 
through contiguity, any idea he has habitually thought of 
in connection with the presented idea. But other things 
being equal, the presented idea is more likely to suggest 
an idea which has been recently or vividly thought of in 
connection with the presented idea. 



ASSOCIATION BY SIMILARITY 43 

It is probable that the word stock, when previously 
thought of, revived the idea most firmly connected with 
it by habit. Now the word stock may suggest a neck 
piece, or soup, since these ideas have been recently in 
mind, and probably vividly so, because the association, 
which seemed rather far-fetched, caught the attention. 

The preceding paragraph applies to association by con- 
tiguity. The idea aroused by association may be simi- 
lar to the idea presented. It will probably be in harmony 
with the emotional tone prevailing at the time. 

If one is in a vindictive frame of mind, the word stock 
may suggest the "stocks," a contrivance formerly used 
to punish criminals. To an unsuccessful or discouraged 
merchant, the word stock may suggest that he has too 
large a stock on hand and that he should reduce it rather 
than add to it. A successful and optimistic merchant 
tends to think of increasing his stock as a means of in- 
creasing his profit. The trend of association is thus deter- 
mined by the emotional state. The idea brought to mind 
will tend to be in harmony with the prevailing emotion. 

A man's emotional state is an important factor in de- 
termining his thoughts and actions. The "bull" is in an 
optimistic state of mind in regard to future prices, while 
the "bear" is pessimistic. 

The salesman must endeavor to arouse in his customer's 
mind a general emotional attitude favorable to the ac- 
ceptance of his proposition. He should aim to create a 
feeling of confidence that business will be prosperous in 
the immediate future. A vivid fear of loss will make it 
easier to sell fire insurance, or a fire-proof repository for 
business records. 



CHAPTER IV 

MEMORY 

The law of habit, manifested in forming associative 
connections among mental processes, explains the abil- 
ity to revive, recollect, or recall processes previously ex- 
perienced. 

The memory and recall of mental processes depends 
upon the fact that during the experiencing of the pro- 
cesses the structure of the brain and mind is modified. A 
permanent change takes place in the structure of the cells 
of the brain and in the arrangement of the connections 
between them. It seems probable that there is also a 
corresponding modification of the mind, though we can 
not give an explanation as to how it occurs. It is clear 
that the correlated mental and physical processes leave a 
trace of their activity behind them. The activity has 
established a course. Thereafter the psycho-physical 
processes are more likely to follow the established course 
than to open a new one. 

Retention is due to the persistence of such a trace of 
previous functioning. When an established brain path 
is again stimulated to activity it gives rise to, or revives, 
the mental process which accompanied its formation. A 
mental process thus revived is said to be remembered or 
recalled. 

44 



MEMORY 45 

It is convenient to use the familiar term "ideas." An 
idea is a process of thinking. A process of thinking is 
found only as a part of a conscious process which also in- 
cludes feeling and volition. Conscious processes always 
have three distinguishable, but not separable, aspects 
known as thinking, feeling and willing. In order to get 
a clear understanding, it is necessary to study one aspect 
or factor at a time. In studying memory we are direct- 
ing attention mainly to the process of thinking. 

When studying the conditions which account for the 
retention and recall of ideas one naturally desires to know 
what he can do to increase his ability to retain and recall 
the things he wishes to know. 

The ability to remember varies with fatigue, freshness, 
health, and age. 

The native retentive capacity varies considerably with 
the individual. In most persons the retentive capacity is 
great enough to serve as the basis of an efficient memory. 
It is much greater than one generally realizes. 

Ideas may be remembered and recalled as a result of 
associatively linking them together by mechanically re- 
peating them. Will practice in this form of memoriz- 
ing increase ability to memorize? Careful experiments 
have shown that such mechanical practice will not im- 
prove the memory to a noticeable extent. 

Careful investigation makes it seem probable that one 
rarely forgets a thing so completely that it is beyond 
the possibility of recall. The record is much more com- 
plete than one can readily revive. Many possible avenues 
of recall seem temporarily closed. One can not open 



46 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

them at will, but they may be opened at any time. This 
is often shown to be true in the case of a person experi- 
encing great danger, as that of drowning, or during a 
fever, or when hypnotized. Long forgotten past experi- 
ences frequently come to our minds in unaccountable 
ways. Such considerations give weight to the following 
conclusion arrived at through experience. Effective 
memory culture must devote its efforts to establishing 
serviceable channels of recall. 

Every thought and experience leaves some trace in the 
mind. Even if one can not recall the previous process 
voluntarily, the persisting trace may make it easier to 
learn some new but similar thing. The modifications 
resulting from former experience will make one think, 
feel, and act differently than he otherwise would about 
things experienced later. 

It is generally believed that the adult's memory de- 
creases steadily in effectiveness as he grows older. The 
memory thus tends to lose in effectiveness as a result of 
the decreasing plasticity of the nervous tissue. Plasticity 
is the property of nerve cells which enables them to re- 
ceive and retain modifications, or traces, resulting from 
the activity which takes place in them. However, the 
plasticity of the nervous system is the least important fac- 
tor involved in the normally improving or failing mem- 
ory. 

Through growing interest, and regular practice, and 
training in right ways of memorizing, an adult's mem- 
ory will increase in effectiveness along the line of his 
vocation and interests, sometimes until extreme old age. 



MEMORY 47 

His mind will be more richly furnished and better or- 
ganized with ideas fitted to serve as cues of recall. He 
will have more skill in assimilating with his large fund 
of well-organized knowledge the ideas which he seeks 
to be able to remember and to recall. 

On the other hand as absorption in one line of busi- 
ness causes one to lose interest in other lines; one's 
memory may be failing in the other lines while it is in- 
creasing in the line of his vocation. 

The rate at which we memorize, and the permanency 
with which we retain and the ease with which we re- 
call, depend somewhat on our opinion of our power to do 
these things. Through self-suggestion, which we shall 
discuss later, we should build up a state of self-reliant 
confidence that our memory will be the ready and trust- 
worthy servant of our will. We should make it a point 
to impress this suggestion on ourselves when we are try- 
ing to memorize, as well as when we are trying 
to recall. As the first repetition is the most effective 
in impressing the memory, we should take care to have it 
correct in every respect. An earnest desire to learn 
makes learning easy. It concentrates effort on what is 
to be learned and prevents disturbing influences from dis- 
tracting the attention. This is of great importance. Only 
as attention passes from one idea to another in concious- 
ness are they linked together by association. The more 
concentrated and active the attention is, the more firmly 
the association is established. 

Trust your memory unwaveringly when you are en- 
deavoring to recall. A wavering attention is likely to 



48 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

start a disturbing train of associations which will lead 
you off the track. 

Memorizing is aided by repetition, but the repetition 
should not be carried to the point of extreme fatigue. 
More will be accomplished by returning to the task with 
fresh powers. When we are fatigued we may experience 
great difficulty in recalling what we recollect easily when 
we are fresh and vigorous. 

The order of recall will be the same as that of learn- 
ing or association. The number 4 suggests 5, 6, 7, 
rather than 3, 2, 1, and C is more likely to suggest D 
than B. Hence care should be taken to study what we 
wish to learn in the order in which we wish to recall it. 
It is harder to correct a wrong order of association, than 
to make it right at first. 

When a series of words or ideas is memorized it is 
found that the associative connection is formed not only 
between the first and second but also with the first and 
third and first and fourth, etc., with a strength decreas- 
ing approximately as the distance increases. 

The reason that the first of an associated series is 
linked with the third and fourth, as well as the second, 
is that the ideas do not drop entirely out of mind, or lose 
their influence in controlling the stream of thought, as 
soon as they disappear from the center of consciousness. 
They remain present as dimly conscious , or subconscious 
processes of rapidly lessening activity, and their accom- 
panying brain processes persist for a noticeable time after 
the ideas have passed out of consciousness. During this 
time the ideas are stamping themselves on the memory 



s* 



MEMORY 49 

and forming associations with the ideas following them 
in consciousness. It is thus seen that the process of 
learning runs on for a little time after our conscious 
efforts cease. During this time the corresponding ideas 
will connect themselves associatively with closely related 
following ideas. But we interfere with the continuing 
process of learning, if we bring unrelated ideas into the 
mind before the process is completed. How easily the 
striking vaudeville joke is driven from our mind, unless 
we stop to think it over! 

If you wish to impress a thing on your own memory, or 
on some one else's memory, allow it a few moments to 
soak in, before turning to something else. If you wish 
to weaken the effect of an impression you do not wish 
to retain, at once turn your thoughts energetically to 
some other subject. Hasten the forgetting of painful 
experiences by turning the attention actively to other 
things. 

Things which have occurred immediately before a 
severe accident or fainting spell are often driven from 
the mind. The persistence of the processes necessary to 
impress them has been interrupted. On the other hand, 
attempts at memorizing immediately before going to 
sleep are often successful because the necessary persist- 
ing activity is not interfered with by following thought 
processes. Another factor which makes such rehearsal 
efficacious, is that the circumstances prevent ideas which 
would interrupt the line of thought from forcing them- 
selves on the attention. Under ordinary circumstances 
of working we must depend upon intense and unbroken 



50 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

concentration of the attention to prevent disturbing fac- 
tors from interrupting the train of thought. 

Bearing the foregoing principles in mind, the business 
man should pause momentarily at proper points of his 
talk, to give the man to whom he is talking time to grasp 
and retain the full significance of what has been said, but 
not long enough to permit a contrary train of thought 
to get started. The pause is important when the aim is 
to produce logical conviction and retention in memory. 
It should occur before turning to a new point. But 
when the time is ripe to close the deal and the aim is to 
bring about a volitional decision, tactful, well-directed 
and persistent effort are in order. 

If one wishes to have an expression, or talking point 
or illustration at command, he can do so by recalling it 
some time before the critical moment, and seeing that it 
is firmly linked by association to something which will 
suggest it. Before making an attempt to present a busi- 
ness proposition or to make a speech, prepare yourself 
by reviewing in outline what you will wish to say. Charge 
yourself with the intention of remembering what you will 
wish to remember. You are then availing yourself of 
the force of suggestion which will be considered more 
fully later on. 

We can remember to keep an engagement by recalling 
it and placing on ourselves the responsibility of so doing, 
even if several hours are to elapse before the time to 
keep the engagement, and our thoughts are to be given 
meanwhile to a wholly different line. In this case the 
sub-conscious mind seems to stand by as an unnoticed 



MEMORY 51 

but watchful sentinel, ready to bring the engagement to 
the attention when the time demands. Or it may be 
merely that the brain tract corresponding to the idea of 
the engagement continues slightly active, with, perhaps, 
a vague consciousness accompanying it, until it is stimu- 
lated into greater activity, by some indication that the 
time for the engagement is at hand. We can often assist 
ourselves to keep an engagement by establishing an as- 
sociation link between the idea of the engagement and 
something else which will come to our notice at about the 
right time to suggest it to us. 

In a similar way many people can awaken at any ap- 
pointed hour by firmly impressing on themselves a sug- 
gestion to that effect. But many people find that the in- 
tention to awaken at an unusually early hour will cause 
them to awaken several times before the appointed hour, 
though they may have an alarm clock at hand which they 
feel certain will prevent them from over-sleeping. The 
persistent sub-conscious activity, whether it is psychical 
or physical in character does not matter, is often so strong 
that the corresponding idea protrudes itself in conscious- 
ness, from time to time, before it is wanted, or when its 
associative connections would not normally recall it. The 
persistence in lessened intensity of the brain activity 
which accompanies an idea's appearance in consciousness, 
makes it easier to recall the idea. Thus the slightest 
movement of a sick child is sufficient to awaken the 
anxious mother. 



52 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

art of memorizing 

The ability to retain and recall ideas can be increased 
only by forming improved habits of memorizing. The 
habits which make for efficiency in memorizing, are a 
habit of clear and adequate observation and thinking, and 
a habit of discriminating and appropriate association. 
Both these habits involve the habit of concentrating the 
attention. 

The prime essential of correct memorizing is to see 
that the things one wishes to be able to recollect are clear- 
ly and correctly perceived. The fact that one wishes to 
remember a thing shows that it has certain qualities 
which make it a factor bearing favorably, or unfavorably, 
on the satisfaction of some interest. The qualities which 
make the thing such a factor are the essential or signifi- 
cant qualities. In other words, the meaning of a thing 
is its bearing on the satisfaction of our interests. 

The thing should be linked firmly by association with 
the interest whose satisfaction it concerns. The most 
salient or characteristic qualities, that is, the ones which 
will serve most readily and certainly as a means of rec- 
ognizing the thing, must be singled out and carefully 
noted. They should be associated with the less obvious 
or significant qualities or meaning, to serve as cues of 
recall. 

We must carefully observe the essential or significant 
qualities of the thing. That is, we must note its bearing 
on the satisfaction of our interests. We must also note 
the significant and easily recognizable characteristics, and 



ART OF MEMORIZING 53 

firmly associate them with the meaning of the thing. 
One should also observe the most natural or important 
connections between the object he wishes to remember 
and his previously existing store of ideas. These will 
be ideas closely connected by previously formed asso 
ciations with the interest concerned with recalling the 
thing. We must connect these ideas with the idea to be 
remembered by as many association links as will be likely 
to prove useful. To make the associative connections 
between the ideas as serviceable as possible, the atten- 
tion should pass from one to the other in the order in 
which it will be useful to recall them. 

Two orders of recall should be established. The inter- 
est should serve as a cue to recall the thing as a means 
of satisfying it. The thing should serve as a cue to re- 
call or awaken the interest and suggest to it that here is 
a possible means for securing satisfaction. To insure this 
result one should notice these relations and should en- 
deavor to establish firm associative connections in both 
orders of recall. The occurrence of the need should sug- 
gest the thing. When the thing is encountered, it should 
suggest an opportunity of satisfying the interest. Sup- 
pose you are looking around for an opportunity to secure 
a better position. When you meet men who may be able 
to give you a position, or help you to get one, you should 
firmly associate the idea of the man with your interest in 
getting a position. Your interest in getting employment 
should suggest the idea of the man as a possible means 
of getting employment. A meeting with the man should 



54 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

suggest that here is a possible opportunity to get em- 
ployment. 

Let us consider a more concrete illustration. Suppose 
you meet a man and it occurs to you that he may at some 
future time be on the market for something you have 
for sale or can give you valuable information or assistance. 
When you meet the man again you will wish to recog- 
nize him as a prospective customer and call him by name. 
You will also wish to recall him when you are endeavor- 
ing to think of prospective customers to visit. 

As you talk to the man, you should notice the most 
prominent characteristics of his appearance so as to im- 
press a clear and accurate likeness of him on your mem- 
ory. If you are a poor visualizer, and do not readily re- 
call in memory, or picture to yourself how things looked 
when you actually saw them, it will be helpful to make 
to yourself a brief verbal description of the features of 
his general appearance which you believe will enable you 
to recognize the man when you see him again. You may 
compare and associate these with similar features of other* 
men you know. For example he looks like Smith but is 
taller. With this picture or idea of the man you must 
firmly associate his name by thinking of it while mak- 
ing your observations. Use his name frequently while 
talking to him. 

After the interview has ended you should strengthen 
the association links you have established by recalling 
the things you desire to remember, and thinking them 
over. With them you can associate the man who intro- 
duced you, the place and circumstances of your meeting, 



ART OF MEMORIZING 55 

the conversation you had with him, his business and so- 
cial position and relation to other men you know, etc. 
Some, or all, of these, or similar associations you should 
form. You should firmly link them to your interest in 
the man, as indicated above. Many men employ a note- 
book to aid them in recollecting. They record in it the 
items they wish to recall, while they are fresh in mind. 
They afterward review them from time to time to de- 
velop the ability to recall them when they are needed. 

If you wish at any time to recall the man's name, or 
appearance, or some fact about him, you can do so only 
by thinking over the ideas associated directly or indirectly 
with what you wish to recall, until one of them, or the 
combined force of all of them, suggests it. 

The advertised memory systems offer nothing of value 
beyond what ordinary psychology can give, as explained 
above. For the natural relations between objects these 
systems often substitute arbitrary and artificial relations 
to serve as cues of recall. They have value only in re- 
membering disconnected and unrelated facts. On the 
whole, it is doubtful if they lessen the time and effort 
required for remembering such facts, if the labor re- 
quired to master the key is taken into account. 

Artificial associations are far inferior to natural and 
logical associations, when such can be formed. What 
one has thus, by thinking, worked into proper relations 
with other things he can think out again, when he needs 
to recall it. By depending on the logical method of re- 
membering and recalling, one will greatly increase his 
ability to think. 



CHAPTER V 

ASSOCIATION PROCESSES IN EDUCATION 

Education is the development of innate capacities of 
thinking, feeling and acting. Educational development 
takes the form of capabilities and habits of thinking feel- 
ing and acting in such ways as will best contribute to the 
harmonious satisfaction of the various interests. This 
will be explained more fully in Part II. 

The developed tendencies of thinking, feeling and act- 
ing must be organized into serviceable association sys- 
tems, if they are to serve effectively in securing satisfac- 
tion for the various interests. 

PROCESS OF LEARNING 

We may define the process of learning as the organ- 
izing of knowledge and skill so that they will be useful. 

The efficient life is the well-ordered purposive life. 
The efficient education is the one which arranges, sys- 
tematizes, or organizes, the materials of knowledge and 
skill in such a way that they will serve most effectively 
as means of attaining life's purposes. Interests and pur- 
poses are the criteria by which one measures the value of 
things. Things have meaning and are valued, only as 
they are perceived as being in the relation of means to 
ends. The aims and purposes of life determine the selec- 

56 



PROCESS OF LEARNING 57 

tion of the elements to be associated, and what associ- 
ations shall be established between them. 

Inefficient doing of a thing comes largely from ineffi- 
cient thinking out of the method of doing, or from failure 
to think at all. Efficient doing consists of selecting the 
essential factors from the unessential, and in skillfully 
organizing and employing them as a means of attaining 
the end in view. 

In order to become generally efficient, one should form- 
ulate an ideal of efficiency and endeavor to attain it in 
every line of activity. 

The principles of efficient learning and thinking are 
the principles which make for efficient thinking and act- 
ing in all lines of business activity. 

Efficient thinking aims at the attainment of some end 
or purpose. Thinking will be discussed more fully in 
Chapter IX. It deals with the solution of problems, or 
the surmounting of difficulties, hindering the attainment 
of ends. One must first think into his experience, or 
learn, what he would use later on in thinking out his 
problems. 

When one encounters a problem whether it is practical 
or theoretical, he can solve it only on condition that it 
suggests to him, by the help of previously formed asso- 
ciations, the means required for its solution. The man, 
who is efficient in grappling with problematic situations 
in an original way, can do so only as his previously 
formed associations suggest original means. 

The process of learning should be so ordered that it 
will be most helpful in thinking out problems. The most 



58 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

important question in education is, how to organize the 
materials of experience into the most serviceable connec- 
tions with each other. 

One who wishes to accumulate a rich fund of experi- 
ence, from which he can draw helpful suggestions when 
they are needed, should cultivate a questioning attitude 
of mind toward the matters with which his business is 
concerned. When he comes upon significant things, he 
should put them in his sinking fund of knowledge, by 
firmly associating them with the interests for which they 
have significance. He will then have a wide range of 
knowledge at his command, from which he can draw, to 
meet the obligations of thinking when they are encoun- 
tered. 

The mind naturally arranges its ideas into intercon- 
nected systems or constellations. Such associative con- 
nections may be formed in the haphazard order in which 
the ideas are impressed on us from without. On the 
other hand the mind, by conscious effort, may select and 
rearrange the elements of experience and strengthen cer- 
tain connecting links, by attention and repetition. 

We can not expect to present our case with best suc- 
cess unless we have previously worked our materials over 
in thought and arranged them mentally in the order in 
which they may be used most effectively. In this we 
should not rely too much on a merely verbal association 
without reference to sense. We should pay attention to 
the interrelation of ideas making the associative connect- 
ing links between them intelligible or logical. A new 
fact is most likely to be remembered if we can connect 



PROCESS OF LEARNING 59 

it clearly and naturally with a system of related facts. 
Notice relations of group and member, likeness and dif- 
ference, cause and effect, means and end, fact and ex- 
planatory principle, etc. One must ask himself, "How 
can I use this fact ?" Perhaps it will be the means of mak- 
ing this argument stronger, or overcoming that objection 
when it is raised. "How can I connect this new fact 
with other facts to enable me to recall it when needed 
and to use it effectively?" 

When one encounters a new fact which he wishes to 
be able to recall and use effectively, he should improve 
the first opportunity to think it out in all its bearings, to 
write it down, and to talk about it. 

MEANING OR SIGNIFICANCE OF THINGS 

The meaning or significance of a thing is the bearing 
it has on the satisfaction of our aims or interests. Mean- 
ing lies in the qualities of the thing which determine be- 
havior toward it. Chair, as a general notion, is a sym- 
bol of a class of objects with which one may do certain 
desired things. All objects with which we may do these 
things are classed as chairs. One passes judgment on a 
thing when he puts it in a general class and attributes to 
it the qualities of the class. An apple has a meaning or 
significance different from a chair, because it concerns 
the satisfaction of different interests. A bench has a 
meaning similar to a chair. But its meaning is different 
from that of a chair, to the extent that the bench has 
certain qualities which affect the satisfaction of our in- 
terests in a different way. 



60 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

A thing thus has meaning only as it recalls, through 
association, the memory of previous experiences with the 
thing, or with a similar thing. Our previous experience 
with an apple has revealed to us that it has qualities with 
which we are concerned in various ways. For example, 
an apple has certain qualities of taste. It can be cooked 
or eaten raw., etc. When an apple is perceived, the mean- 
ing attributed to it comes from the awakening of previ- 
ously formed dispositions to think, and feel, and act in 
regard to it. A thing has significance only to the extent 
that present consciousness of it is supplemented by previ- 
ous experience with it, recalled through association. 

LEARNING AIMS TO GRASP THE SIGNIFICANCE 
OF THINGS 

The purpose in learning is to discover the qualities of 
objects and the relations existing among them which af- 
fect our behavior toward them, so that we can take in- 
telligent advantage of the information in gaining satis- 
faction for the demands of our nature. We wish to know 
how our various interests will be affected by the various 
changes which may occur among the things of our ex- 
perience. Knowledge aims at grasping the qualities and 
correlations of the objects of our experience, so that we 
can deal with them intelligently in our efforts to secure 
the satisfaction of our interests. 

Learning is a process of adjusting one's self to a new 
factor of experience by the light of present and past ex- 
perience, so that the factor will be properly appraised 
when it is again encountered in experience, or is con- 



SIGNIFICANCE OF THINGS 61 

sidered as an element of future experience; and so, also, 
that the factor can be recalled when the needs of future 
experience so require. 

The process of recognizing the significant qualities 
and interrelations of the various objects- of experience is 
a process of judgment and inference. 

MOST EFFICIENT METHOD OF LEARNING 

To apply the most efficient method of learning, one 
should first find out the general nature and significance 
of the thing he is undertaking to learn. He should make 
a preliminary survey to see what interest is concerned 
with it, and the ways it concerns the interest. 

The next step is to get an adequate understanding of 
what is to be learned. The endeavor should be to get a 
clear, definite and complete impression of all the parts 
of the thing in the order or arrangement in which they 
are presented. 

In the third stage of learning one should aim to select 
the more significant features, or qualities and character- 
istics, and to discern their relationships. Effort should 
be concentrated mainly on the proper understanding and 
arrangement of the more significant points. Less im- 
portant matters should receive less attention. 

In the last stage one should see that the general mean- 
ing, purpose, or bearing, of what is being learned is 
clearly in mind. He should review the associations fixed 
upon as most important, and see that they are properly 
organized and correlated with each other, in view of the 
general purpose. 



62 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

By attentive and thoughtful repetition the meaning- 
ful associations should then be firmly associated with each 
other, and with the general purpose, in the order in which 
it will be most advantageous to recall them. A written 
outline will often give valuable help in learning. 

Learning should be undertaken as a process of organ- 
izing the materials of knowledge in such a way that they 
will be most serviceable in attaining the purposes one 
endeavors to realize. Associations of resemblance or 
contrast, or contiguity, or class and member of the class, 
cause and effect, etc., will have ultimate value, only as 
they supply means for realizing the ends which our trains 
of thought are endeavoring to reach. Hence we see the 
importance of keeping the aims and purposes in mind 
while forming the associations. 

If one is to gain the greatest profit from the reading 
he does, he should apply the right method of learning. 
He should endeavor to grasp and condense or summarize 
the significant points of what he reads. It is often help- 
ful to underline words, or to write a brief outline on the 
margin of the page. Such an outline made by one's self 
is much more helpful than one furnished by the writer. 
He should fix upon the general topics to serve as cues 
of recall. He should make similar summaries of the sub- 
ordinate points to be recalled under each general topic. 
While establishing meaningful associations among the 
minor topics, he should at the same time keep the general 
topic under which they come, in mind, and link them 
firmly to it by similar associations. 

He should clearly perceive the relations of the general 



METHOD OF LEARNING 63 

topics as parts of an organic whole, and firmly fix in 
memory the perceived relations. 

Learning should always be a process of working over 
and reconstructing in terms of one's own thought pro- 
cesses. In this there should be a wise selection and em- 
phasis of what is significant for the realization of one's 
purposes. 

The reader should be able to reproduce in his own 
words the definitions, generalizations, deductions and 
other thought connections occurring in what is read. He 
should be able to make a systematic recapitulation or 
summary of what has been read. Taking brief notes will 
often prove of great practical help in mastering what is 
read, so that one can reproduce, in logical continuity its 
salient features when one needs to recall them in his 
thinking. 

When one is endeavoring to learn so as to reproduce 
verbatim, he should endeavor in like manner to grasp 
and organize the features which give the thing signifi- 
cance. He can thus greatly lessen the effort required in 
memorizing and increase the practical value of what is 
learned. 

The great disadvantage of learning by means of arbi- 
trary mnemonic devices results from the fact that one does 
not grasp the meaning of the material so learned. Hence 
the material is not available as a means of attaining the 
purposes which determine the trend of our activities. 
Bonds of association that are not meaningful are gen- 
erally of little practical value. 

It is generally more advantageous to undertake to 



64 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

learn as a whole than in part. But if the amount to be 
learned is so large that it seems expedient to break it 
up into parts, each part should be attacked according to 
the method outlined above. The various parts should 
finally be joined and organized as a whole, and .firmly 
associated with each other. In order to link a following 
part with a preceding part, by means of a cue of recall 
with which it has been associated, the general bearing 
and cue of recall of the following part should be held in 
mind while the preceding part is being reviewed and 
firmly associated with that part. This cue should be one 
from which the various points of the following part can 
be developed readily in the proper order. 

As the last stage of learning, one should practice re- 
call in reviewing the whole until it can be reproduced 
readily. Weak associations should be strengthened. The 
practice in recall should be carried considerably beyond 
a point at which the whole can first be correctly repro- 
duced. While practicing reproduction, the speed of re- 
call can be gradually increased. What has thus been 
learned should be carefully reviewed on succeeding days, 
until it can be reproduced correctly and without hesita- 
tion. One should improve the earliest possible oppor- 
tunity to make the first recall of what he endeavors to 
learn. 

If learning is to be carried on most effectively, the at- 
tention must be intensely concentrated on the thing to be 
learned. Such application is very tiring. One should not 
continue his attempt at learning until the element of 
fatigue paralyzes his effort. 



METHOD OF LEARNING 65 

After an attempt at learning, one should let his mind 
rest for a few minutes before undertaking something 
else. During this time the associations are becoming 
fixed. Their formation would be interfered with, if other 
things were actively taken up. A brief rest will pre- 
vent such interference, or retroactive inhibition, as it is 
called. 



CHAPTER VI 

INTEREST AND ATTENTION 

Every one knows, in a general way, what is meant by 
interest and attention. At times one attends closely to 
an event he is witnessing, or to a conversation or speech 
he is hearing, or to a proposition which is being pre- 
sented to him. At other times his attention wanders. He 
accounts for his inattention by saying he is not interested 
in the thing. It gives or promises no pleasure. It does 
not concern his fortune or welfare. One is likely to be 
inattentive to what a person says ; if his personality re- 
pels, or his approach is not tactful. 

Inattention to a thing that becomes an element of con- 
sciousness results from the fact that the attention is given 
to some other thing which arouses more interest. Ab- 
sent-mindedness is a state in which one's attention is so 
completely concentrated on developing one line of thought 
that one does not notice other things which otherwise 
might arouse interest. 

We may get a clearer notion of the nature of interest, 
from which attention results, and its relation to objects, 
by considering concrete examples. Ordinarily one is not 
interested in a time table. Even if he notices it, he at 
once turns his attention to some other object. But if one 
is going to take a journey, he may become intensely in- 
terested in a time table, as a means of learning the trains 

66 



INTEREST AND ATTENTION 67 

that will take him to his destination most conveniently. 
One's interest in the time table wanes, and his attention 
to it ends, when he has gained the desired information. 
His aim or purpose has been realized, and his interest has 
been satisfied. 

Perhaps the reader previously has had no interest in 
psychology, but has been led to believe that he can learn 
something from it which will enable him to improve his 
efficiency in business. If he finds that an understand- 
ing of psychology will enable him to solve the problems 
encountered in dealing with men more satisfactorily, he 
will become interested in psychology. 

Objects not interesting in themselves will become so 
by bringing them into a significant relation to that which 
is already interesting. Show a man that the object you 
wish to sell him is the best means of realizing some aim 
or purpose he is interested in gaining, and he will be- 
come interested in the object and will desire it. 

At first one may be interested in accumulating money 
as a means of securing satisfaction for other interests. 
As one labors to accumulate wealth, his interest may be 
transferred from the things the wealth will secure, and 
through association may become attached to and centered 
wholly on the accumulation of money as a means of 
securing satisfaction, as the traditional miser is attracted 
to and hoards his gold. 

PRACTICAL AND THEORETICAL INTEREST 

If the reader has had no interest in psychology, but has 
been led to believe that he can learn something from it 



68 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

that will improve his efficiency in business, an interest 
thus inspired is a purely practical interest. A purely 
practical interest may lead the business man to try to get 
hold of and use the conclusions of the psychologist, with- 
out putting forth the effort required to understand the 
facts and reasonings on which they are founded. 

The interest in understanding the facts and reasoning 
from which the general principles are developed is known 
a^ a theoretical interest. One must develop a certain 
amount of theoretical interest in psychology, if he is to 
master it well enough to make it practically helpful to 
him. One whose interest is too narrowly practical will 
not be able to recognize a familiar principle in the new 
setting in which it is always found, and in its varying re- 
lations to other principles. 

VOLUNTARY AND SPONTANEOUS ATTENTION 

It is helpful to distinguish between voluntary and spon- 
taneous attention. 

Voluntary attention is attention directed to an object 
by an act of will, influenced by some motive other than 
interest in the thing attended to. Salesmanship affords 
a good illustration of this. A prospective customer may 
give this sort of willed attention to an article because of 
a request made by the salesman. Perhaps the salesman 
has assured him that the article will be a satisfactory 
means to the realization of some purpose in which he is 
interested. For example the salesman may claim that 
the article will save expense and prevent losses. If the 
customer finds in the article nothing to warrant the sales- 



Voluntary and Spontaneous Attention 69 

man's assertion, he does not become interested in it and 
his attention soon wanders from it. 

If the selling talk and demonstration of the salesman 
leads the man solicited to discover in the article a prom- 
ise of bringing about the saving claimed for it, he will 
become interested in it and his attention will remain fixed 
upon it for some time. To hold the attention when it 
is once secured, the salesman must continue to develop 
interesting points, and thus lead the customer to discover 
in the object a growing promise of making the desired 
saving. This spontaneous, or non-voluntary, attention, 
held by the developing interest in the object, is what the 
salesman must secure, if he is to be successful. 

Expectation of securing satisfaction arouses voluntary 
attention. Progressive satisfaction of the expectation 
leads to spontaneous attention. 

That is attended to which seems to concern the satis- 
faction of the aims, purposes, interests, or instincts which 
at the time are more or less clearly in consciousness. 
Passive attention of an instinctive sort is given to in- 
tense, moving, pleasant and unpleasant stimuli, to those 
which arouse curiosity, and those which have a rhyth- 
mic character, etc. The various instincts and interests 
and their part in influencing conduct will be discussed 
later. 

We give spontaneous attention to a thing we are con- 
scious of being immediately concerned with. Such a 
thing takes on the aspect of being interesting in and of 
itself. It requires no effort to attend to such things. 

Voluntary attention is given to a thing which is not 



70 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

in itself immediately interesting, but on the ground that 
it may concern, or is believed to concern, the future sat- 
isfaction of some interest. Such attention is very fatigu- 
ing. The ability to give attention of this sort ■ which is 
sustained for any considerable length of time can be 
developed only by a rigorous course of training. 

The power of giving sustained voluntary attention is 
the ability which enables one to direct his efforts per- 
sistently and unswervingly toward the attainment of some 
aim or ideal. The end to be gained is the motive which 
gives the trend to conscious activities. 

Things thus attended to through voluntary attention 
tend to become immediately interesting. The interest is 
transfered to them through association. Henceforth they 
may arouse spontaneous attention. 

Tasks which were at first uninteresting, or positively 
disagreeable, may thus become interesting. The business 
man will finally come to turn with pleasure to tasks which 
originally aroused a feeling of repugnance. A knowl- 
edge of this fact may do much to encourage one to put 
forth the initial efforts required to perform certain un- 
pleasant tasks connected with new work , he is under- 
taking. 

The idea of taking up a new task arouses a feeling of 
repugnance. The first efforts are put forth with re- 
luctance. Persistence in the efforts tends gradually to 
overcome the antagonism felt for the task. The work 
done grows accordingly in efficiency. One should accus- 
tom himself to taking up new tasks that seem uninterest- 
ing with the consciousness that the worst will come first, 



Voluntary and Spontaneous Attention 71 

and will soon be over. It is like a cold plunge. The first 
contact with the water is painful, but the final result is 
stimulating. 

There is a rhythmic rise and fall in the effectiveness 
of attentive effort. As the power of attention wanes, the 
task may come to seem irksome. There is a tendency to 
yield to distracting influences. Under such circum- 
stances, if one can hold himself resolutely to the task, 
he will find his efficiency again increasing with the ris- 
ing wave of attention. 

In order to accomplish things worth while, one must 
be able to put forth a persistent effort to attain a remote 
end. He must have the ability to resist the distracting 
influences which tend to lure him aside. Such ability can 
come only through the formation of habit, as was pre- 
viously explained. 

A man without interest in his work is quickly fatigued. 
A strong interest in what one is doing may render avail- 
able undreamed of stores of energy and enable him to 
perform great feats. We soon become tired when walk- 
ing about familiar and uninviting streets. In a novel en- 
vironment^which stimulates interest, for example in a 
strange city, one can go much farther without noticeable 
weariness. 

attention and PEELING 

We can not feel without attending. Attention arouses 
feeling, when it brings awareness that the welfare or in- 
terests of the person attending are concerned with what 
is being attended to. The feeling is pleasure when the 







72 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

thing concerns one favorably, and displeasure when it 
concerns one unfavorably. The converse is not always 
true. Things which give immediate or temporary pleas- 
ure sometimes concern well-being unfavorably. 

ATTENTION AND SALESMANSHIP 

Salesmanship is the ability to influence the mind of a 
man so that he will desire what you offer him and will 
perform the acts necessary to secure it. The principles 
of the art of selling are the principles which are to be 
applied in every case in which one individual seeks to 
influence the acts of another. For this reason we make 
frequent use of salesmanship as a means of illustrating 
the psychological principles of business efficiency. 

The principle that we can attend effectively to one 
thing, or one closely connected system of things, at a 
time has many important applications in business. Do 
not try to sell a man who must attend to other matters 
coming up from time to time. If you can not have the 
man's whole attention, arrange to call when you can get 
a satisfactory hearing. Some salesmen prefer to take a 
customer to a sales room or sample room, where there is 
nothing to distract his attention. The salesman must be 
careful also not to let his own attention be distracted or 
wander in presenting a business proposition. 

Develop one talking point at a time with clearness, sim- 
plicity and strength. Several sentences may be required 
to develop one point satisfactorily. Remember that each 
sentence should be a complete thought expressed in 
words. If two or more talking points are taken up in 



ATTENTION AND SALESMANSHIP 73 

the same sentence, divided attention is aroused in the 
hearer. One makes the same mistake if he inserts be- 
tween two sentences dealing with the same point, a sen- 
tence dealing with a different point. 

It is harder at times to tell whether you will be satis- 
fied with a thing in a store where it has many rivals for 
attention, than it is at home when attention is exclusively 
centered upon it. A salesman may readily show a cus- 
tomer so many different lines, and get so many things 
rivaling each other for attention that no satisfactory 
choice can be made. 

When demonstrating samples or articles and soliciting 
sales the good salesman will often have only one article 
in view at a time and talk solely about that article. At- 
tention must be centered on the thing displayed, if effec- 
tive desire for it is to be aroused, and inhibiting or hin- 
dering ideas are to be avoided. 

In accordance with this principle the insurance agent 
will determine as soon as he can the kind and amount of 
the policy which he believes will best meet the prospect's 
requirements, and will then endeavor to concentrate at- 
tention on that policy and sell it. So the shoe clerk will 
determine what shoe will best meet the customer's needs 
and then will endeavor to sell that shoe. The time will 
come in every sale when attention should* be centered on 
a single object, and an attempt made to create a desire 
for it. 

Suggestion can be made effective and the volitional act 
of closing can be brought about only on condition that 
desire for one object fills the mind. Of course the one 



74 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

object may be a group or class of objects considered as 
one in the proposition. 

When the act of closing is to be performed, the atten- 
tion must be centered continuously on that one act, and 
held to it by the desire aroused, and by the suggestion 
and persuasion of the salesman, so that the idea of do- 
ing other things is excluded from consciousness. 

If one can think effectively on only one thing at a time, 
how can the salesman think ahead and plan what he is 
going to say next while his attention is given to answer- 
ing an objection? How can he be certain that an effec- 
tive answer to the objection will be at his command? 
Preparation in advance is the answer. The line of 
thought to be followed to meet an objection, or make a 
selling point must be carefully thought out in advance, 
and thoroughly mastered, though not necessarily com- 
mitted to memory. The thought of each selling point 
and the answer to each objection should be tagged with 
a cue which will recall it when needed. The general topic 
involved, expressed in brief form, makes a good cue. The 
selling points should then be arranged in an order effec- 
tive for presentation and thoroughly associated in this 
order. If this is done properly, one will always have at 
his command the thing he should say next. If he is thus 
prepared, when an objection is raised, it should at once 
flash through his mind that this, for example, is one of 
the "It is out of my line" sort. This general topic should 
at once bring to mind all the arguments necessary to 
overcome the objection successfully. The salesman may 
thus meet the objection, while he is thinking ahead and 



ATTENTION AND SALESMANSHIP 75 

preparing for the next step. But his aim should be to 
have only one thing at a time receive the attention of his 
customer, and that the aspect of the sale then being pre- 
sented. 

Each new point should be connected with some inter- 
est already in the mind. It will add to the effectiveness, 
if curiosity can be aroused so that the point will seem to 
come as an answer to a question previously in mind. This 
can be done by stating the aim at first when a new point 
is taken up. 

A thing presented to the attention is generally taken 
in as a total impression. It is not likely to be analyzed, 
unless the important features are clearly indicated and 
attention is directed to them. Observation as practiced 
by ordinary persons is extremely untrustworthy. It is 
very rare that two observers v^f ill agree in their reports 
as to happenings they have witnessed. This can be 
proven by questioning people to find out how many of 
the most significant qualities of familiar objects they are 
conscious of. We rarely see all in objects that we have 
previously learned to be in them. It is very difficult to 
find a new quality in an object, unless it is pointed out to 
us. The more familiar the object is the readier we are to 
believe that our vague and carelessly conceived notions 
represent it adequately. 

No matter how simple and self-evident the points of 
advantage in an article may seem, few indeed will notice 
them, unless the salesman indicates them definitely and 
clearly. Perhaps one can not help seeing them after they 
are once indicated, yet unless attention is directed to 



76 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

them, they are likely to pass unnoticed. So, also, we are 
not likely to discriminate resemblances and differences 
unless they are pointed out. 

Though the qualities which give a long familiar arti- 
cle commercial value may have been very well known at 
one time they may gradually pass out of mind. They 
should be pointed out and revivified from time to time, if 
they are to have strong suggestive force in creating de- 
sire and leading to purchase. 

No matter what his line is, every salesman should 
make some appeal to the eye of his customer as well as 
to the ear. Though we can not attend effectively to two 
different things at the same time, attention is held more 
strongly to the one thing presented through both the eye 
and ear. An appeal should also be made to the sense of 
touch and the muscular sense, if it is an object which 
can be handled, or a machine or model which can be 
worked. In the latter case the machine or model should 
not only be explained and demonstrated, but the cus- 
tomer should be led to try his hand at running it. 

The thing itself, or a model, or sample is most effec- 
tive, but if this is not practicable a picture may be used. 
Motion pictures will be very effective in selling some 
things. In some cases the appeal to the eye will consist 
merely of figures set down on paper in the view of the 
customer, or a diagram or drawing so made. Or an out- 
line of important selling points may be written down. 
Some such appeal accompanying the selling talk holds 
the attention better and makes a clearer and stronger im- 
pression. • 



ATTENTION AND SALESMANSHIP 77 

Many animals "freeze" or remain perfectly still to 
escape notice. Moving objects or changing things at- 
tract the attention. For this reason moving things are 
often employed in window displays. Likewise a display 
of figures or objects suggesting motion attracts atten- 
tion, though in less degree. A sign which alternately 
disappears and appears is more effective than one con- 
stantly displayed. 

Bright objects attract attention. Red has the most 
compelling force, but it is highly irritating to the eye and 
mind. The power of red to attract attention has caused 
it to be selected for danger signals. This quality of red 
is taken advantage of by bull-fighters. Red may be used 
to attract attention, but should not be depended upon to 
hold it. Orange and yellow and green have similar prop- 
erties of attracting attention, but are less irritating, de- 
creasing in strength in the order named. 

Bright flashes of light, as in intermittently illuminated 
signs, attract attention. So do loud sounds, or intense 
stimuli of any kind, and also things which give pleasure. 
Any thing out of its usual place or of a novel character, 
may attract attention. We attend to people or animals, 
or pictures of them. 

ATTENTION DIRECTS MENTAL PROCESSES 

Attention is the controlling factor in consciousness. 
The line followed by attention determines the course of 
thought and action. Several ideas may be in the mar- 
gin of consciousness at the same time. They may be 
presented through the senses or revived by association. 



78 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

Only the one among these ideas to which attention is 
directed will get into the clear center of consciousness. 
The ideas which do not receive attention soon drop out 
of mind. The idea on which attention is directed re- 
mains longer in consciousness than it otherwise would. 
It is more clearly perceived, and becomes the dominant 
factor in determining the trend of association. Various 
ideas associated with the one the attention is thus focused 
upon, may come more or less clearly into consciousness, 
but the one of these which the attention selects will in 
turn become dominant in the train of thought. 

In selecting the ideas which will come into mind, the 
attention controls the feelings which pervade conscious- 
ness, and the choices it makes, or the acts of will it per- 
forms. In more technical language, the attention, in ^ex- 
ercising its selective function, controls the direction of 
thought, feeling, and volitional acting. 

The above applies to conscious processes in which as- 
sociation alone is depended upon to supply the ideas 
which come into mind. The conditions are modified 
somewhat when some one is presenting arguments and 
making suggestions to action. The arguments and sug- 
gestions displace the ideas which would come through 
association alone. But the arguments and suggestions 
have influence in controlling the mental processes and ac-* 
tion, only as they are selected by the attention. 



CHAPTER VII 

FOCUS AND MARGIN OF ATTENTION 

The clearness of mental states varies with the attention 
given to them. 

The focus of attention is the spotlight on the stage 
of consciousness. When an idea is in the clear central 
light of consciousness it is said to be in the focus. Sur- 
rounding this center of clear perception are ideas of 
which we are but dimly and vaguely aware, if we are at 
all aware, that they are in consciousness. These are 
known as marginal ideas. 

The reader can make clear to himself the distinction 
between the focus and margin, by practicing introspec- 
tion. He will find that, as he reads, the focus is filled 
with what he is reading. There are, no doubt, ideas in 
the margin of his consciousness at the same time, which 
he can become conscious of, if he pauses to notice them. 
He may find among these ideas the ticking of a clock, 
the sound of people walking or talking in the house, the 
noises of the street, etc. 

Ideas not attended to do not get into the clear center 
of consciousness, but remain obscurely in the margin, 
and soon drop out of mind. 

The mind is focused on the idea to which it attends. 
Such an idea becomes clearer and remains longer in con- 
sciousness. Close attention to an idea makes it more 

79 



80 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

likely to be remembered. By attending to an idea we 
bring it about that the ideas associated with it will come 
next into mind. 

One can not give concentrated and effective attention 
to more than one thing at a time. However, one can 
get along fairly well in doing some task which he has 
made habitual or familiar through practice, and which 
as a result requires but little attentive effort, while, at 
the same time, his attention is focused on some unfami- 
liar or difficult task which requires delicate adjustments 
to meet new conditions. 

One can attend to an end to be gained and at the same 
time compare, criticise, choose or use means fitted to gain 
the end. But in any case when one attempts to attend 
to things which are not parts of one general process, or 
are not closely related to each other, the attention will 
alternate between them. Neither can get the effective 
attention which either alone would receive. Divided or 
distracted attention results in weak feeling, feeble im- 
pulses to action, and indecisive action. 

EXPECTANT ATTENTION 

Some of a magician's success comes from baffling the 
eye of the spectator. A greater part of it comes from 
diverting the attention from significant or essential things, 
and centering it by suggestion on features which do not 
reveal the true explanation. 

The magician also creates a state of expectant atten- 
tion. By carefully planned and skillfully employed sug- 
gestions, he works the spectator up into a sympathetic 



EXPECTANT ATTENTION 81 

state of mind. He leads the onlooker to expect vividly 
that the result he proposes to attain will be secured by 
the means or process he pretends to use. Criticism has 
been forestalled by predisposing to belief that the result 
will come in the way and form specified by the wonder 
worker. This belief fills the mind of the onlooker so 
fully that he sees what he strongly believes he will see. 

A preconception of the intellectual sort will warp ob- 
servation and judgment. A practiced reader does not 
readily see misprints. He overlooks them easily, even 
when looking for them. One standing on a crowded 
street looking for a friend to come along, may believe 
he sees him many times before he really appears. He 
may mistake for his familiar friend, men who are very 
unlike him. 

Expectant attention often leads one to misjudge the 
real qualities of objects presented for his consideration. 
One sees what he expects to see. If one approaches a 
proposition in a skeptical frame of mind, he finds things 
which arouse suspicion and exaggerates their importance. 

If one is confident that everything will turn out all 
right, he is less critical. We prejudge the article favor- 
ably. Our mind is colored by the satisfaction we expect 
to receive. In this state of mind we are likely to over- 
look weak points, and see only the good ones. Good 
will as a business asset is largely a predisposition to look 
for satisfaction. 

A strong desire, mingling with a strong feeling of 
confidence, often leads one to act without giving due con- 
sideration to factors indicating the wisdom of another 



82 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

line of action. The fraudulent advertisement, or sell- 
ing proposition, creates and takes advantage of such an 
uncritical state of mind. Attention is centered on some 
strong claim, or alluring promise. Confidence and desire 
are aroused. The mind is filled with a foretaste of the 
satisfaction which will result, if the attractive promise 
is made good. The person is made to believe that he is 
in danger of losing the golden opportunity, if he does 
not act at once. In such a state of mind, the weak fea- 
tures of the proposition do not receive proper consider- 
ation. 



CHAPTER VIII 

ACTS OF WILL, OR ID^O-MOTOR ACTIVITY 

The term ideo-motor activity is accurately descriptive 
of the process which takes place in the mind when an 
act of will is performed. If the idea of doing a thing 
gets into the mind, so that the attention is centered upon 
it, the actual doing of the thing follows naturally, and 
as a matter of course, if it is not prevented, or, as it is 
known in psychology, inhibited by an other, or opposed, 
idea obtruding itself on the attention. 

To get a clear understanding of how an idea passes 
out into action, or is inhibited by another idea, recall 
what passes through your mind when you awake in the 
morning. If your mind is wholly filled with the idea that 
you must get up at once or you will miss your breakfast, 
or be late to work, you get up immediately without fur- 
ther volitional activity. 

But along with the idea of getting up and the impulse 
it arouses may occur the more pleasurably tinged idea 
that this is Sunday and you have another snooze coming 
to you. If you accept the Sunday-snooze idea and allow 
it to get into the focus of consciousness, and permit the 
idea of getting up to lapse into the vague margin, the 
odds are heavy that you will stay in bed. The attractive 
Sunday-snooze idea inhibits the getting-up idea. 

If someone offers you something to eat between meals 

83 



84 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

when you are hungry you may have a strong desire to 
accept it. Along with this desire, you may find peeping 
over the threshold of consciousness an unwelcome little 
idea that eating between meals will spoil a good dinner 
coming later, or will give you indigestion. In that case, 
the apparently weaker idea of not eating may hold in 
check, or inhibit, the lusty impulse to eat. 

A knife that is seen may arouse an impulse to grasp 
it and to cut with it. A ball may arouse an impulse to 
throw. 

The pen proffered to the customer and the order blank 
placed before him by the salesman tend to arouse an im- 
pulse to sign the order. The coin holder in an envolope 
suggests sending the money. The suggestion to fill out 
and send in a coupon arouses an impulse to do so. A dis- 
played object may arouse an impulse and desire which 
lead to purchase, without extensive deliberation. 

IMPULSIVE ACTS 

Every thought of an action tends to work itself out 
into action. The reader should make this clear by intro- 
spection. Recall a recent tour of observation through 
a store, or some similar experience. You will be able to 
feel the incipient motions of the various muscles as you 
picture yourself going about. As you recall your obser- 
vations, you will feel your eyes moving. Imagine your- 
self sitting down and getting up, going up stairs, open- 
ing a door, or looking at the ceiling, or talking, or doing 
anything you please, and notice how you can feel your- 
self actually beginning to perforin the actions. Merely 



IMPULSIVE ACTS 85 

think of a word and you will find traces of accompany- 
ing activity in the vocal organs. Every idea of an action 
is also an impulse to perform the action. 

To illustrate an impulsive act which is fully performed, 
suppose one sees a child about to walk in front of a rap- 
idly approaching car, he may impulsively, without stop- 
ping to think about it, reach out to pull him back. The 
thing seen arouses a strong feeling and suggests an act 
felt to be demanded by the situation. The act is at once 
performed without other act of will, more technically 
known as a volitional fiat. In the same way one might 
kick at a dog trying to bite him. A tempting display on 
a counter may arouse an impulse to purchase, which is 
carried out without deliberation. 

CONTROL OF IMPULSE 

If a man saw a child fall into deep water, he would feel 
a strong impulse to jump in to rescue him. But if he 
could not swim, the idea of the uselessness of obeying 
the impulse to jump in would doubtless prevent him from 
so doing. 

If someone has said something to anger one, he may 
yield to the impulse to strike him, or curse him. But re- 
flection on the act and its consequences will make him 
see clearly that such an act habitually performed will in- 
terfere seriously with success in life. An emotion of re- 
gret and shame arises. These emotions become asso- 
ciated with the bad consequences of yielding to the angry 
impulse and with the feeling of anger. In the future the 
angry impulse will not only arouse the impulse to strike, 



86 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

but it will also call up a strong counter idea of the bad 
consequences of yielding to the impulse. One centers 
attention on the latter. He closes his mouth as it tries 
to say the angry word. He opens his clenched fist and re- 
laxes his tense muscles. He exerts effort to act calmly. 
The angry impulse fades away, inhibited by the con- 
trolling idea. The experience repeatedly performed de- 
velops the habit of control. In this way character is de- 
veloped in which right principles of action are uniformly 
manifested in the acts that are performed. Purpose be- 
comes dominant in life. This principle will be applied 
and more fully developed under "Character Building and 
Personality." 

ACTS OF WILL INVOLVING DELIBERATION 

When two alternate lines of action are open before one 
he may be unable to choose between them for some time. 
Suppose it is a question whether he shall accept this po- 
sition or the other. Both have their advantages and dis- 
advantages. An effort is made to bring all of these 
clearly into view. The attention passes from one position 
to the other and back again, weighing advantages against 
disadvantages and comparing relative advantages. Final- 
ly he comes to the conclusion that one, on the whole, 
offers the most desirable prospects. He turns his atten- 
tion from the less desirable and fixes it on the more at- 
tractive. In so doing the act of choice has been made. 
The fiat of the will has gone forth. The more desirable 
position has been accepted. 

Deliberation between alternatives is necessary for de- 



ACTS OF WILL 87 

liberate action. But carried too far it has a paralyzing 
effect on action. As was the case with Hamlet "the 
native hue of resolution is sicklied o'er with the pale cast 
of thought." The active, energetic, practically success- 
ful type of mind is one that makes sure that all the essen- 
tial facts bearing on the situation have been given due 
consideration. He then cuts loose from all but one line 
of action, selected as the most desirable. He no longer 
thinks of the undesirable lines, but concentrates all his 
energies on carrying out the chosen course. 



CHAPTER IX 

THINKING 

Thinking is the ability which distinguishes the human 
being from the lower animals. Men who really think 
effectively render great service, and get big pay. Those 
who let others do their thinking for them are doomed 
to be poorly paid. 

Thinking is a process of formulating ends and of 
adapting means to the attainment of ends. It substitutes 
efficient, methodical effort for blind trial and error. 

The line of development which mental processes fol- 
low is determined by a more or less explicit aim, or pur- 
pose, which the person desires and strives to realize. 
Thinking takes place when one becomes conscious of a 
not immediately realizable end he desires to attain. The 
thinking takes the form of casting about for ways and 
means of attaining the desired end. 

When one encounters an obstacle to the attainment of 
a purpose, a state of stress, or effort, is aroused in his 
mind. The anticipated attainment of the desired end 
arouses, a feeling of satisfaction and striving toward the 
end. The less satisfactory present state, contrasting with 
the desired one, arouses a feeling of aversion, or striv- 
ing away from it. In a consciousness of obstructed at- 
tainment of purpose, a state of mingling desire and aver- 
sion is found. A feeling of hostility to the obstacle in 

88 



THINKING 89 

the way of the attainment is also experienced. This stim- 
ulates the effort to get around the obstacle, or overcome 
it, or even to destroy it. One has reached a thought crisis 
which demands clear and effective thinking, rather than 
blind yielding to any one of the various impulsive-feeling 
aspects of desire, as the state as a whole is generally 
called. See "Arousing Desire" in Chapter XIV. 

Any activity is said to be interesting, or to arouse a 
feeling of satisfaction, when it awakens within us the 
feeling that we are accomplishing something worth while, 
whether the "something" is very clearly defined or not. 
A feeling of interest is aroused by the consciousness of 
making progress tow T ard the attainment of a desired end. 
The feeling of interest is a warming up to the activity, 
and at the same time a propensity to continue the activ- 
ity which promises to satisfy the interest. The feelings 
of aversion and hostility lose in strength, as the feeling 
that one is "getting warm," and the foretaste of the an- 
ticipated satisfaction grow stronger. 

The desired end may be near or remote in the order 
of events. When the end is remote, it may be necessary, 
in order to attain it to formulate many nearer ends which 
are subsidiary to it. The remote end then serves as a 
guide, or norm, in formulating the nearer ends, and in 
correlating and co-ordinating the efforts to attain them. 

The efficient worker devotes his efforts continuously 
and persistently to the things and aims which he believes 
will play an important part in the attainment of his larger 
purposes. Efficiency requires that the non-essentials be 
eliminated. It demands that our aims or purposes be ap- 



/ 



90 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

praised according to the contribution to well-being that 
may be secured by attaining them. The efficient person 
cultivates a knowledge of and desire for, the things worth 
while. He works to attain the things which give the 
richer and more enduring forms of satisfaction.* 

Thinking always has a purpose or end in view. This 
purpose is to secure satisfaction for an instinct or inter- 
est. The origin and nature of the various interests, and 
the different lines of activity in which they seek satisfac- 
tion will be discussed later in Chapter XIII. The end 
which is held in view in thinking is felt to be desired. The 
end which it is desired to attain through the thinking 
processes is to bring about such an ordering of conscious 
experiences as will best satisfy the awakened interest, 
or felt need. 

Thinking occurs only when one becomes aware of an 
obstruction or hindrance to securing the satisfaction of 
the interest or need. There is the consciousness that one 
faces a problematic situation which must be solved be- 
fore a desired end can be gained. 

The problematic situation may consist essentially of 
the awareness that the end is not clearly enough com- 
prehended and formulated and correlated with other 
ends, to permit one to work definitely and efficiently to- 
ward its attainment. For example the problems of pro- 
moting welfare work among employees are of this char- 
acter. Efforts along this line are often largely ineffec- 
tive, because the one putting them forth does not clearly 
and adequately apprehend what definite ends must be 

*See discussion of "Well- Being" Chapter XIII. 



THINKING 91 

attained in order that the welfare may be promoted sat- 
isfactorily. The ideal in doing welfare work should be 
to promote the harmonious satisfaction of the various 
interests of the employee involved in a fully developed 
personality. Success in the work will involve seeing to 
it that the employee has such incentive, wisdom, means 
and opportunity as will enable him to secure such satis- 
faction. See Chapter XV. 

If the purpose of the thinking is to overcome the dif- 
ficulties in the way of accomplishing a definite mechani- 
cal result, or of performing some act, such as selling an 
article, the problem may consist in selecting appropri- 
ate means and in employing them skillfully in the attain- 
ment of the clearly formulated purpose. 

The first step in effective thinking and acting is to 
formulate and find answers to definite and pertinent ques- 
tions. What is the end, or purpose, or aim, or goal I 
wish to reach? What is the character of the obstacles 
that have obstructed the flow of my activities ? Will this, 
that, or the other suggested answer be of assistance in 
solving the perplexity? 

When one has clearly perceived his problem, the next 
step is to make a careful analytic search for the elements 
which have a significant bearing on its solution. The 
criterion for the selection and rejection of materials avail- 
able is their fitness for use as a means for attaining the 
desired end. The features of the materials which make 
them fit for this use are the qualities which give them 
significance for the end in view. The next step is the 
selection and arrangement of the significant features in 



92 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

such a way that they will contribute to the realizing of 
the end in view. 

In the process of thinking, the interest or purpose dom- 
inant in consciousness at the time, through the form of 
activity known as attention, or volition, exercises a se- 
lective control over the stream of thought. The interest 
exercises this selective control by determining on which 
of the various ideas coming into the margin of con- 
sciousness the spotlight of attention shall be focused. 
When this control is being effectively exercised, only 
such ideas are received into the clear center of attention 
as are believed to be relevant in some way to the end 
w T hich the thinking is endeavoring to gain. The ideas 
become interesting to the extent that they seem to be 
relevant. 

The interesting idea which is received into the focus 
of consciousness is more vividly perceived and remains 
longer in mind than the marginal ideas which are merely 
accorded a passing glance. The interesting aspect thus 
held in the clear center of consciousness becomes domi- 
nant in determining the ideas which will next come into 
mind through association. 

As the ideas recalled through association appear above 
the threshold of consciousness, they are noticed. If they 
appear to have no bearing on the business of the moment, 
they are given no further recognition. They remain 
withering in the dim margin for a brief moment, as they 
drop out of mind. 

If the idea occurring seems to have a bearing on the 
desired solution, the attention is fixed upon it. It is criti- 



THINKING 93 

cally examined and fitted into its proper place in the 
thought system which is being constructed. If the solu- 
tion is not readily reached, an attempt is made to hold 
all apparently relevant ideas in the background of con- 
sciousness. In this way there is built up a fringe, or con- 
stellation, of ideas mutually helpful in suggestive force, 
in the hope that one, or all of them, will finally suggest 
the solution the judgment approves. 

When an interest or purpose thus controls the processes 
of thinking, it lapses into the background of conscious- 
ness. The attention is directed to the ideas that appear 
in the foreground, discriminating, measuring, and ac- 
cepting or rejecting them. But the purpose must not be 
allowed to lapse entirely out of mind, or thought will 
be deflected from its guidance. 

The purpose controlling the development of conscious 
processes, remains in the background, but its influence 
pervades and gives coherence to the flow of thoughts, 
feelings, and strivings. Figuratively speaking, it is the 
commanding officer viewing and appraising and order- 
ing the whole field of conscious activities. Though it 
occupies a position on the field of action, it is aloof from 
the various activities and vicissitudes of the actual con- 
testants. The associative and logical thought processes 
are employed merely to serve the purposive processes of 
feeling and striving, just as the soldiers and the equip- 
ment of the army are used as a means of accomplishing 
the aim of the general. 

In active thinking as has been said, one has a definite 
aim, or purpose, or problem in mind. He is searching 



94 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

for a means of gaining the end or solving the problem. 
Success in overcoming the difficulty encountered depends 
absolutely on the ideas which come, to the mind through 
association. Success will depend upon the care and skill 
previously exercised in organizing knowledge into as- 
sociation systems. 

Efficient thinking and doing must be founded on, and 
spring from efficient learning. The process of learning 
efficiently was previously explained. Such learning con- 
sists in organizing the materials of knowledge into such 
forms of associative systems as will contribute most sat- 
isfactorily to the use of the materials in gaining satis- 
faction for the interests concerned with them. In such 
learning, the interest to be served by the organization of 
knowledge must be kept alive in the margin of conscious- 
ness, and must be firmly associated with the organized 
elements with which it is concerned, by concentrating 
attentive effort on firmly establishing the association. 
Darwin thus spent years in accumulating material bear- 
ing on the problems of organic evolution. 

The truly efficient man is the one who can see problems 
where others are unaware of them. He has cultivated a 
questioning and critical attitude of mind toward the af- 
fairs with which his activities are concerned. He is able 
to bring a well-organized intelligence to the solution of 
the problems he thus discovers. Such a man has real 
initiative and brings about improvement and progress. 
Efficiency in business involves first, the adequate for- 
mulation of the ends to be striven for. One must then 
locate the obstacles in the way of attaining the ends. He 



THINKING 95 

must clearly perceive and select and skillfully employ 
the best means available for overcoming the difficulties 
and gaining the end. 

In order to think and act adequately about a situation 
or proposition, one must have developed keen powers of 
discernment which enable him to select the significant 
aspects and hold them clearly in the focus of attention. 
Right thinking and acting require that elements not rele- 
vant be disregarded, and that relevant matters be kept 
in mind, until the means or way to the end is found. If 
one has previously fitted himself to handle the situation, 
and keeps his attention concentrated on significant quali- 
ties or points, he will find coming into mind, through as- 
sociation, ideas which will guide him to a wise course of 
action. 

One can have fertility and resourcefulness in think- 
ing, only as he has previously established an extensive 
system of associations, organized in accordance with 
their significant features. Fortunate is he who can see 
the significance of things, and can recall them when their 
significance will make them useful ! The thinking of 
one whose knowledge is so organized will be significant 
rather than superficial. He will not be led off into in- 
considerate action by the first plausible suggestion which 
occurs to him. He will be freely supplied with sugges- 
tions along alternative lines, which will lead him to care- 
fully examine and appraise the superficially plausible 
suggestion. 

When the suggestions do not come through the asso- 
ciations previously established, one should undertake a 



96 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

systematic search for them. This search may take the 
form of carefully planned experiments or investigations 
of some sort. Or one may seek help in the experience 
of others through conversation or reading. 

The solution of the problematic situation may thus de- 
mand that one acquire new learning. To avoid the un- 
certainty and tremendous loss involved in learning main- 
ly by the method of blind trial and error, one should give 
an intelligent and searching investigation to the factors 
which may have significance for the solution of the prob- 
lem. The number of failures in thinking and acting can 
thus be greatly reduced, but not entirely eliminated. The 
wider and more intelligently organized the past experi- 
ence has been, the more effectively it can be brought to 
bear on finding a way to overcome the difficulties of a 
novel situation. 

TEST OF TRUTH 

The more clearly one has centered his attention on 
methods of procedure, and has discriminated them from 
their context, and associated them with the general con- 
ditions under which they can be applied, the more effec- 
tively he will be able to bring the previously learned 
methods to bear in dealing with a novel situation. 

Novel problems must be solved always in terms of 
previous experience, by combining or using the elements 
of such experience in new ways. One must search either 
his own experience or the experience of others for fac- 
tors bearing on the solution of his problem. It is a dif- 
ficult task to select the few significant factors in the 



TEST OF TRUTH 97 

problematic situation from the many irrelevant features 
which are manifested along with them. When these are 
found, it is still more difficult to form the right hy- 
pothesis, of theory, of dealing with them, than it is to 
determine whether we are on the right track to the solu- 
tion after the hypothesis has been found. The only 
method of procedure is to critically examine the various 
possible solutions suggested. The most promising of 
these possible solutions should be selected as an hypoth- 
esis. By study and trial, or experimentation, one must 
endeavor to ascertain whether the tentatively accepted 
hypothesis offers the best way out of the difficulty. The 
test, as to whether the true solution has been reached, is 
whether it will guide us satisfactorily in dealing with 
the elements of experience, so that we attain our pur- 
pose. If we find that it works satisfactorily we accept 
it; if not, we reject it. 

Whether a suggested solution, or tentative hypothesis 
is correct, can be determined only by testing it in sub- 
sequent experience. However, one can often arrive at a 
high degree of probability by carefully thinking out the 
consequences that can be foreseen as likely to follow 
such an attempt at verification in experience. In imag- 
ination, one can anticipate the results of experience. If 
the situation does not involve too many novel elements, 
he can reach a reasonable certainty that his forecast of 
consequences is essentially correct. This is the process 
of verification, whether we are searching for general 
notions which will enable us to deal with the presented 
materials, or whether we are searching for a particular 



98 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

means of attaining a general end. By imaginatively 
testing his solutions in experience one can form a con- 
clusion that they are probably true. He should not make 
the mistake of regarding them as certainly true, until 
they have been actually tried out in experience. For 
a discussion of "Belief and Truth" see Chapter IX. 

The expert has reflected on experience, has studied 
and classified actual and hypothetical cases, and has 
formed useful association systems. He thus has many 
fully formed conclusions and principles of action stored 
away in his memory. As soon as the essential facts of 
a new proposition are clearly established, he at once rec- 
ognizes it as belonging to a class with which he is al- 
ready familiar. Without apparent consideration, or de- 
liberation, the expert, thus prepared, can immediately and 
confidently give a decision on matters of the utmost im- 
portance. He has previously gone through the processes 
of investigation and deliberation. He sees his way clear- 
ly at once, and is ready to act confidently in accordance 
with his judgment. An appeal addressed to an expert 
should take a different form from one addressed to an 
inexperienced man. 

It must be remembered that thoughts originate, or 
grow, only from one's own experience, past and present. 
One is skillful in judging and fertile in thinking and rea- 
soning, only as his past experience has been rich and 
varied, and skillfully organized and assimilated. One, 
so prepared, can readily select the right idea and apply 
it accurately in solving the problems at hand. 

The genius is one who clearly perceives the significant 



TEST OF TRUTH 99 

aspects and relations of things, and links them together, 
and to the related parts of his experience, by helpful as- 
sociations. 

JUDGMENT AND REASONING 

When one discriminates the various thought relations 
among the elements of experience he is said to pass judg- 
ment upon them. So also when a choice is made and a 
decision is reached after deliberating over the conse- 
quences of following different lines of action, the act is 
known as a judgment. 

The function of judgment, as an element in the process 
of thinking or reasoning, is to notice the significant re- 
lations existing among the objects of thought. Among 
the significant relations are resemblances and differences, 
the relation of means to end, individual to class, cause 
and effect, the estimation of merit or value, and the dis- 
crimination of various other relations between ideas. 

One passes judgment on a thing when he decides that 
its value is equal to or greater than that of some other 
thing, or when he decides that he can use it to bring 
about an effect he desires to produce, or concludes that 
a certain effect has resulted from a cause of such and 
such a character, etc. 

BEUEF AND ACTION 

Deliberation results normally in conviction, belief, and 
action. If one is convinced or believes that it will rain, 
he will carry an umbrella; unless taking everything into 
consideration, he is convinced, or believes, that getting 



100 BELIEF AND ACTION 

wet will involve less inconvenience than carrying the 
umbrella. In either case the belief determines the action. 

One is always ready to act along the line which he be- 
lieves will contribute most to the realization of the pur- 
pose which at the time seems to him most important. 
Because it seems most important;' his attention is fixed 
upon it, or rather it holds his attention. 

Deliberation and reasoning aim to eliminate rivalry 
and conflict among impulses to action. Deliberation is 
brought to a close, when order and harmony are estab- 
lished among the impulses to action. When a decision 
has thus been reached, one refuses to attend to sugges- 
tions arousing impulses to act along an opposing line. 

In attending to the acts appropriate to the conviction 
or belief established, one sets the switches for their per- 
formance. At last, when all preparations are made, and 
the judgment declares that the time and circumstances 
are ripe for the believed in action, and that the line is 
open, then the act is performed as a matter of course. 
See Chapter XXIII for a discussion of u Belief and 
Truth." 

EFFICIENCY AND THE AIMS IN LIFE 

Efficiency involves thinking out the best ways of do- 
ing things. After the best ways of doing have been 
thought out, they must be made habitual. Efficiency is 
thus made up of a two-fold proficiency; a proficiency in 
habit formation, and a proficiency in discovering the re- 
spects in which existing habits may be improved. 

One can become skilful in determining how habits can 



AIMS IN LIFE 101 

be improved only as he becomes skilful in estimating 
comparative adaptability as means to the attaining of 
the important purposes of life. Hence the fundamental, 
or primary, requisite to efficiency is the clear formula- 
tion of the ends to be attained in life. 

One who wishes to become efficient in business must 
first clearly discern and formulate the ideal aims of busi- 
ness. A clear aim is the prime essential of one who de- 
sires to hit the mark of business success. 

One must not merely aim clearly, he must hold the 
goal steadily in view. He must push on resolutely to- 
ward the goal. See Chapter XXVIII. 



PART II 

FUNCTION, QUALITIES, AND CONSTITUTION OF 
CONSCIOUSNESS 

CHAPTER X 

FUNCTIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 

The conscious or mental factors and processes have 
served, in the process of evolution, as a means of adjust- 
ing the conscious individual to his environment. Mind has 
been preserved and developed because it has enabled its 
possessor to adjust himself to the factors of his environ- 
ment. In fact, adjustment, or lack of adjustment, can 
have meaning only when the mind is recognized as one 
factor which is in a relationship of adjustment to another 
factor known as its environment.* 

The evolutionary development is generally described 
as a process of adjusting the individual to his environ- 
ment. It may with equal truth be considered a process 
in which the environment is made to contribute to the 
satisfaction of the instincts and interests of the individual. 
The environment is adjusted to the individual just as 

*One who is studying psychology for the first time may 
find this chapter hard to understand. In that case, it may 
be passed over until the book is read a second time. This 
applies also to the chapters entitled "Predispositions" and 
"Will to Live." More immediately practical matters will be 
taken up again in the chapter entitled "Classification of In- 
terests." 

102 



FUNCTIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 103 

truly as the individual is adjusted to the environment. 
The function of business is to make the environment con- 
tribute to the satisfaction of instincts and interests. 

The environment of the conscious individual is made 
up of two great classes of phenomena. One class of 
these includes the things which behave in accordance with 
purely mechanical laws. One gains understanding of 
and control over these things by studying the various 
pure and applied sciences and arts which have to do with 
things in which conscious processes are not manifested. 

The other great class of environing phenomena in- 
cludes the facts and processes manifesting themselves in 
the behavior of men and of animals. It embraces all 
processes in which mind enters as a determining fac- 
tor. Our purpose does not include a consideration of 
the animals. This discussion will be restricted to the 
human factor. 

Behavior includes all processes in which consciousness 
has entered as a determining factor. Psychology is the 
science of behavior. It aims to give to the practical 
man of affairs knowledge which will enable him to un- 
derstand and wisely order and control his own behavior. 
It also aims to give him an understanding of mental 
processes which will enable him satisfactorily to adjust 
himself to, and to influence the behavior of others. Psy- 
chology embraces, as its sphere, all activities into which 
consciousness enters as a determining factor. 

The understanding of the behavior of a conscious be- 
ing involves an understanding of the conscious factors 
and processes by which the behavior is determined. 



104 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

Such understanding of consciousness involves an analy- 
sis into parts and the apprehension of the interrelations 
of the parts. 

In Part I, various mental processes were studied. They 
were studied merely as activities in complete abstraction 
from the factors manifested in the activity. 

When heat is explained as a mode of motion it is not 
meant to imply that the motion which causes the sensa- 
tion of heat exists merely as an abstraction independently 
of all objective reality. Any particular sensation of heat 
must be regarded as resulting from the motion of some 
particular material thing to which certain properties may 
be ascribed. These properties manifest themselves in 
experience as qualities or characteristics attributed to the 
thing. One must study these properties, qualites, or char- 
acteristics, in order to deal satisfactorily with the things. 
In so doing he does not necessarily commit himself to 
any metaphysical explanation of the origin or nature of 
the reality thus manifested. 

A mere description of mental processes as activities 
will no more suffice to give one an adequate understand- 
ing of consciousness, than a mere description of the di- 
rection, velocity and extent of various motions, will give 
one a satisfactory understanding of the great diversity 
and richness of the properties of the material world. We 
can understand the material world only as we look upon 
it as composed of moving masses which have a definite 
constitution. This constitution is revealed in the various 
qualities of the objects which impress themselves upon 
us in our experience. 



FUNCTIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 105 

In like manner the activities or processes of conscious- 
ness must be thought of as manifestations of an exist- 
ing reality. We cannot directly observe the nature of 
this reality. We do not need to commit ourselves to any 
metaphysical explanation of its nature or origin. But 
in order to deal satisfactorily with others we must study 
certain properties, qualities, or characteristics of the mind 
which are revealed to us in experience. 

It requires more than an understanding of mere pro- 
cesses considered in abstraction from definite qualities or 
characteristics of the mind, to answer such questions as 
these. What is the cause of this customer's dissatisfac- 
tion? Will this advertisement have the desired "pull"? 
"What makes a certain man think that way?" "How can 
he be led to think this way?" 

How can we understand the statement that the sight 
of an apple arouses a desire to eat it? We are under 
the necessity of attributing a definite group of qualities 
to the apple, so also we must attribute a definite consti- 
tution or structure to the mind. 

In order to explain the interaction of consciousness 
and its environment, we must attribute certain enduring 
qualities to the influencing factors of the environment. 
We must also attribute certain enduring qualities to the 
influenced and reacting consciousness. 

The qualities of the mental constitution and structure 
are manifested mainly as predispositions to certain lines 
of conscious activity. These predispositions are primarily 
innate, as instincts or instinctive tendencies. The heredi- 



106 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

tary bent is largely influenced in its development by en- 
vironmental factors. 

We must endeavor to get some idea of the qualities 
and constitution of the mind, as well as of the processes 
and activities in which these characteristics are mani- 
fested. 

Our aim is to analyze purposive acts into their simple 
elements and to make clear the interdependent correla- 
tions of these elements. We wish to understand the prin- 
ciples underlying the normal co-operation of these ele- 
ments in determining conduct. 

In our view, conduct is determined not by the inborn 
or acquired organization of the nervous system, but by 
the psychical predispositions which manifest themselves 
through, and by means of, the physical organization. 

Not the interaction of physical forces, but the inter- 
workings of meanings, aims, feelings and impulses give 
rise to conduct. Inborn psychical, rather than physical, 
predispositons give tendencies to conduct. In conduct 
things are appraised and dealt with according as they 
are perceived to have a bearing on the carrying out of 
our psychical predispositions. 

One who attempts to influence the behavior or actions 
of men will be greatly assisted by understanding the 
origin, nature and significance of these predispositions. 
One can influence men only through an appeal to the 
emotions, sentiments, or interests, developed from these 
predispositions. Each instinct has its peculiar emotional 
and volitional tendencies which may be aroused by an 
ideational content. 



FUNCTIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 107 

The qualities and characteristics of the constitution of 
the mind are manifested in various processes and ac- 
tivities. 

The intellectual constitution is revealed in the processes 
of perception of objects and in judgments of affirmation 
and denial and in the various processes of judgment ex- 
ercised in reasoning and comparing. 

The affective constitution is revealed in the feelings of 
painful or disagreeable, pleasurable or agreeable, excite- 
ment or depression, and in the various sentiments and 
emotions manifested in the instincts and interests. 

The volitional processes are desire, and striving for, 
and aversion and striving away from. These mental pre- 
dispositions to think, feel and strive, are functionally con- 
nected. They are elaborately organized by educational 
influences. 



CHAPTER XI 

PREDISPOSITIONS 
AUTOMATIC AND RE)FXKX ACTS 

The human organism is born with the ready made 
ability to perform automatic and reflex acts. Automatic 
acts are the beating of the heart, the activities of the di- 
gestive organs, etc. The involuntary closing of the eye 
when something threatens, also coughing and sneezing 
are reflex acts. 

The ability to perform such acts results from inherited 
physiological structure. A preformed pathway in the 
nervous system carries the stimulus over into action, 
without the intervention of consciousness as a factor. 
We may be conscious of performing such acts, but we 
do not consciously direct or supervise them. 

Such acts are explained by the constitution of the 
nervous system. The nervous impulses which bring about 
these acts pass through paths which are preformed. 
They are fully developed previous to experience. The 
acts are invariable and mechanical in character. 

INSTINCTS 

Instincts are predispositions which are psycho-physical 
in character. That is, the behavior is determined by both 
psychological and physiological factors. The qualities 

108 



INSTINCTS 109 

or characteristics observed in objects awaken certain cor- 
related processes of feeling and striving, which are fac- 
tors in determining the behavior in regard to the object. 

An eminent authority has defined an instinct as "an 
inherited, or innate mental and physical predisposition to 
experience an impulse to attend to certain things, to feel 
desire or aversion for them, and to act in a predeter- 
mined way in regard to them." 

Another definition is the following: "An instinct is a 
complicated purposive act which the doer strongly de- 
sires to perform, and which is done without awareness 
on his part of the real end at which it aims, and with- 
out previous education in its performance." 

The fact that the purpose which an instinct serves is 
not foreseen at the time of its first performance, has 
led to the term "blind instinct." In human beings, at least, 
instinct ceases to be blind as one grows in experience, 
though it may lose none of its impelling force. With 
experience the real end comes into view and determines 
the choice of means to attain it. Such modification is 
often necessary to adapt the act properly to the cir-. 
cumstances in which the individual finds himself. This 
is true largely because the conditions of human life have 
changed greatly from those of the remote evolutionary 
period in which the instinct originated. 

In its first manifestation, an instinct is an impulse to 
perform an act the true end or purpose of which is not 
known to the one experiencing the impulse. The impulse 
is unexplained and unquestioned, though it is clearly 
conscious. The idea of doing the act is fascinating. It 



110 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

arouses an almost irresistible desire to carry it out into 
action. 

The setting hen feels that she simply must set, even if 
the nest is empty. So the boy may be led to collect arti- 
cles of no real value, so one sex is attracted to the other, 
so also a man may feel an almost irresistible impulse to 
go hunting or fishing. 

To a large extent, the innate predispositions of men are 
capacities and tendencies, rather than fully perfected 
capabilities. As tendencies and capacities they require 
development through education. The form of capability 
into which they may be developed by education is vari- 
able. In consequence man is more readily adaptable to 
changing conditions of his environment than are the 
lower animals in which the instincts are more completely 
preformed and less variable. 

Authorities differ considerably in the number of in- 
stincts they ascribe to man. Some recognize as instincts 
only such predispositions as resemble most closely the 
more fully perfected preadjustments of the lower ani- 
mals. The number of instincts they mention is small. 

Most authorities will agree in the broad view that man, 
as a result of his inherited structure and tendencies to 
development in his psychical and physical organism, is 
predisposed to do a much larger number of things than 
are the lower animals. 

The conduct of men originates from various conscious 
impulses to feel and to act, which originated ages ago in 
the evolutionary process as a means of fitting the indi- 
vidual to his surrounding conditions. How men de- 



INSTINCTS 111 

velop from these impulses the ability and tendency to act 
reasonably and rightly is an interesting problem. Sug- 
gestive and enlightening attempts have been made to 
trace out the lines and factors of this development, but 
they can not be entered into here. We have to assume 
the development as worked out to the stage existing in 
the normal human being. 

One who looks merely at the seed, can not even glimpse 
the beauty and fragrance of the unfolded flower. So 
one who confines his view solely to the specific instincts 
common to man and the lower animals can not adequate- 
ly apprehend the diversified and enriched qualities of the 
instinctive endowment, as it is unfolded in the most 
highly developed men. We must assume instinctive ten- 
dencies rich enough and varied enough to explain the so- 
cial organism and the higher moral nature which have 
developed from them. These impulses have largely deter- 
mined the form taken by civilization. The form of civil- 
ization and the moral ideal are the clearest evidences we 
have of what these impulses are aiming at. They show 
us the nature of our instinctive endowment, as far as that 
nature has been revealed at the present stage of evolu- 
tion. 

ENUMERATION OF PREDISPOSITIONS 

Taking the broad view, the following are among the 
more important instinctive capabilities and tendencies. 

Appetite for certain foods and disgust for others, 
anger, hate, affection, rivalry, emulation, jealousy, shy- 
ness, fear, teasing, self-assertion, modesty, sexual love, 



112 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

parenthood, and the tender emotion, the instinct of re- 
production, desire for approbation, and aversion to dis- 
approbation, sympathy, imitation, play and recreation, 
fighting, nomadism, agriculture (making things grow), 
hunting, constructiveness, secretiveness, inquisitiveness 
(curiosity or desire to know), acquisitiveness, the preda- 
tory instinct, artistic interest, gregariousness, respect for 
others, co-operation with others, loyalty to group interest, 
subordination to superiors, morality, religon or self- 
abasement, and interest in the behavior of others. 

Instincts have originated as a means of adjusting in- 
dividuals to the surrounding conditions of their life. 
Those who have possessed this instinctive equipment have 
been better fitted to survive and prosper in the struggle 
for existence. They have transmitted like capacities to 
their descendants. A few examples will make clear the 
part played by the instincts in ordering the affairs of life. 

People are instinctively interested in moving things. 
This interest probably originated from the fact that mov- 
ing things may concern our well-being in a way that de- 
mands immediate action. The interest in moving things 
is taken advantage of in many ways in advertising. 

We instinctively fear whatever threatens to prevent 
the attainment of a desire. The consciousness of being 
alone in the dark or in a vast wilderness may arouse a 
fear that is none the less genuine, though one recognizes 
there is nothing to harm him. We feel an impulse of 
aversion or striving away from what arouses the emo- 
tion of fear. The impulse to avoid the danger we fear 
leads to fleeing or freezing. However, what hinders the 



PREDISPOSITIONS 113 

satisfaction of another instinct may arouse pugnacity and 
the emotion of anger. One then feels an impulse to over- 
come or destroy the hindrance. We hate a person who 
maliciously hinders the attainment of our purpose. 

The appetite for food arouses an impulse to secure it. 
The instinct of repulsion and the emotion of disgust cause 
the ejection from the mouth of substances which have a 
bad odor or taste. We feel an emotion of disgust and 
an impulse of aversion, or shrinking away from, slippery 
or slimy objects which come into contact with the body, 
or from carrion, or foulness, or filthiness. 

Emulation impels one to rival the achievements of a 
superior. Rivalry, developed to excess, grows into envy, 
jealousy, anger, and hate. We are jealous of persons 
whom we regard as our rivals. We envy them their suc- 
cess. Acquisitiveness, or the desire to get possession of 
things, leads to competition and rivalry. It leads to envy 
when the thing desired belongs to another. One is envi- 
ous of a person when he covets his goods, and may be- 
come jealous of him as a successful rival for the goods. 

Secretiveness impels one to conceal his business from 
others. Its instinctive character is shown by the fact that 
it often influences one when there is no real reason for 
concealment. 

Curiosity is interest in knowing. Curiosity and the 
emotion of wonder lead to the examination of the un- 
familiar. In business, curiosity, or interest in knowing 
about a thing, should be clearly distinguished from ac- 
quisitiveness or interest in securing it. Curiosity may 
be made to lead to acquisitiveness, if proper advantage is 



114 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

taken of it. Acquisitiveness develops into the interest in 
acquiring wealth. 

Some of the instincts in their primitive form have lost 
much of their usefulness under modern conditions. Hunt- 
ing and the nomadic instinct are examples. At present 
they are valuable mainly as pleasant sources of health- 
ful recreation. The predatory instinct should not be al- 
lowed to develop at all. 

The parental instinct is manifested in the desire to pro- 
tect offspring and to further their interests. The tender 
emotion and benevolence are manifested in affection for 
others and in a desire to protect and further their in- 
terests. 

The gregarious instinct is manifested in the desire to 
be one of a crowd, and in the aversion to being alone. It 
leads one to regard the interests of others as of equal 
importance with his own, and to seek to further them. 
It leads one to work in co-operation with others. The 
interest of philanthropy is closely related to it. 

The instinct of self-assertion, or self-display, and the 
emotion of elation lead one to aspire to leadership and 
to seek to impose his will on others. Self-display is close- 
ly related to the sexual instinct. 

The instinct of self-abasement, or self -subjection, and 
the emotion of subjection lead one to conform to the will 
of others. Elation and subjection have been called posi- 
tive and negative self-feeling. 

Interest in the behavior of others has originated in 
evolution because the welfare of each individual is largely 
concerned favorably or unfavorably with the behavior 



PREDISPOSITIONS 115 

of others. Through the imitation of actions and the sym- 
pathetic induction of emotions, it is the greatest educa- 
tional influence at work in developing the capacities of 
the individual. 

One has a strong instinctive interest in the aims and 
results of the behavior of others. He wishes to know 
what their purpose is, what they are doing, and what is 
the result of their effort. The motion picture owes a 
great deal of its attractiveness to the fact that it gives 
free play to the exercise of this instinct. The pictures 
of persons in advertisements appeal to it. For lack of a 
better name, we have called this instinct interest in the 
behavior of others. 

Instinctive interest in the behavior of others leads one 
to imitate their acts and to experience feelings similar to 
theirs. The acts are imitated either because of a special 
instinct of imitation, or in accordance with the principle 
of ideo-motor activity. The latter principle holds that 
ideas of action, on which the attention is closely centered, 
tend to carry themselves out into appropriate actions. 
Even if the impulses to action are not carried out, they 
awaken desires and aversions similar to the ones experi- 
enced by those whose actions are observed. 

An additional word in regard to interest in motion pic- 
tures may not be out of place. We have a strong pre- 
disposition to strive to learn the significance of the actions 
of others. There is also an instinctive capacity to un- 
derstand them. The utilization of this capacity was of 
great importance during long ages before language was 
developed to any extent. The successful exercise of this 



116 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ability gives great satisfaction to strong primitive in- 
stincts. This satisfaction, in many people, is stronger 
than that derived from grasping the significance of the 
behavior through spoken or written words. The "mov- 
ies" appeal more effectively than the spoken drama to 
interest in action. 

The motion picture can not compete with the spoken 
drama in clarifying the world of ideas. The spoken 
drama has a field of its own in satisfying the interest in 
real literature, interpreted and illuminated by the effective 
delivery and acting of those competent in their art. 

Sympathy is the general instinctive tendency to experi- 
ence an emotion which we perceive to be manifested in 
others. We respond as instinctively to the observed ex- 
pression of the emotion as we would to the object fitted 
to arouse the emotion, and for similar reasons. We in- 
stinctively imitate the expression of an emotional state 
we observe in others. This imitation arouses a similar 
emotion in us. We are thus prompted to act as the per- 
son experiencing the state was prompted to act in re- 
gard to the stimulus which may concern us as it con- 
cerned him. 

Optimism manifested by one person tends to beget 
optimism in those around him. Confidence arouses con- 
fidence. A grouch may depress people near him, when 
they have no real reason for the feeling. 

The fact that another person is thus instinctively shar- 
ing and expressing our emotion tends to heighten it. The 
sympathetic spread of an emotion through imitation ac- 
counts for the fact that the emotion experienced in wit- 



PREDISPOSITIONS 1 17 

nessing a play as one of a large crowd is greater than 
when it is witnessed alone. It is the clue to under- 
standing many of the facts of crowd psychology. 

The processes of imitation of action and sympathetic 
experiencing of emotions play a very great part in fitting 
one for membership in society. Through this process 
one comes to do the conventional things. His standards 
of valuation become socialized. He comes to appraise the 
relative importance of the various interests and the means 
of satisfying them according to the standards prevalent in 
society. 

Instincts do not appear until the necessary nervous 
connections have developed through bodily growth. No 
two children manifest exactly similar instincts. They 
vary in number, in relative strength, and in time and or- 
der of their manifestation. All instincts will appear 
sooner or later in a normal person, if a suitable stimu- 
lus is experienced when the nervous system has reached 
a proper stage of development. 

INSTINCTS REQUIRE EDUCATIONAL DIRECTION 

In a general way the human instincts have tended to 
adjust the individual to the necessary conditions of his 
existence. They enable him to make the environment 
contribute in some measure to the satisfaction of his 
needs. 

In man, the instinctive preadjustment has never at- 
tained to the perfection which it has reached in the lower 
animals. The instincts are largely tendencies and capa- 



118 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

cities which must be developed into capabilities through 
educational influences. 

MODIFICATION OF INSTINCTS 

Instinctive behavior may be analyzed into the follow- 
ing important elements : The perception of an object 
which serves as a stimulus ; the emotion and impulse 
aroused by the stimulus; the behavior which results as 
the response to the stimulus. 

One may learn to improve the instinctive response to 
a stimulus. He may learn to discriminate the circum- 
stances under which he should make the response, from 
those under which he should not make it. He may 
through experience, associate with the object which first 
called out the response, another feeling and impulse 
which will lead to a different response. "The burnt child 
dreads the fire." One may learn to respond instinctively 
to objects which at first failed to arouse such a response. 

An instinct may be modified by associating with the 
object and the feeling it arouses another form of response. 
The response to the feeling and impulse aroused by the 
stimulus is shunted off into another line of action. In 
this way one may be led to make the conventional rather 
than the primitive response to the stimulus. Actions are 
thus made to conform to the norms of conduct prescribed 
by society. The sex instincts, for example, require such 
modification. 

Instincts may be modified by refining, sublimating, 
generalizing, and co-ordinating them. The gregarious, 
co-operating, and fighting instincts, and those of emula- 



MODIFICATION OF INSTINCTS 119 

tion, play, etc., are thus modified by properly conducted 
sports. One who fights for victory in accordance with 
the rules of the game is likely to become one who fights 
the battles of business and political life in accordance 
with the principles which should govern conduct in those 
spheres. 

It is not safe for the individual to follow blindly the 
guidance of his native impulses. Pugnacity may be taken 
as an illustration. If the instinct is left to respond with- 
out intelligent guidance to any stimulus chance may offer, 
it may lead to acts of great disadvantage to the individual, 
and to the formation of pernicious habits. 

Combativeness, or pugnacity, may also be danger- 
ously strengthened by an extreme militaristic policy, or 
dangerously weakened by a policy of peace at any price. 

Instinctive tendencies should be guided through edu- 
cational direction into channels which will lead to the 
performance of actions which will be valuable under ex- 
isting conditions. The fighting instinct may be taken 
again as an illustration. There is no doubt that a re- 
fined and tempered form of the fighting spirit is a valu- 
able element of character. This may be developed by 
proper guidance, in athletics and in other forms of activ- 
ity. Habits are formed which become tendencies to ac- 
tion subsidiary to instincts. 

Actions which promote the satisfaction of instincts 
tend to be pleasurable. The pleasure tends to increase 
and prolong the activity. Actions which hinder the sat- 
isfaction of instincts tend to be painful. The pain and 
pleasure which results from the actions becomes associ- 



120 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ated with them. Pleasure and pain serve as secondary 
springs of action subsidiary to impulses. 

An instinct may develop into a good or bad habit or 
die out from lack of exercise. It may be so strong as to 
lead readily to over development. Or it may be weak 
and require strong stimulation and much exercise. 

As a result of stimulation and exercise the instincts 
may be developed into habits. In their developed forms 
they manifest themselves as interests and temperamental 
traits of character. These will be discussed later. 

An instinctive tendency may fail to develop into an 
element of character, because of the lack of an appro- 
priate stimulus, or the lack of an opportunity to per- 
form the act. The failure to develop may result from 
the fact that one yields so fully to one instinct that he 
neglects to exercise others. 

An instinct may be forcibly repressed. While a merely 
neglected instinct may die out, one that is forcibly re- 
pressed may merely become dormant and manifest itself 
in some foolish or perverted act later in life. 

It is the business of the various educational agencies 
to see that proper stimuli and opportunities for exercise 
are furnished to each instinct when it ripens. In this 
way the instinct may be developed into an interest or trait 
of character useful to the individual. 

The instincts are often in rivalry with each other. The 
educator must see that they are properly harmonized. 
He must also see that the person is furnished with knowl- 
edge and incentive to guide his development along the 
line of his real needs. 



MODIFICATION OF INSTINCTS 121 

The mental constitution of an individual has taken its 
form during the course of evolutionary development. 
This constitution includes the rather specific instincts we 
have mentioned. It also includes more general innate 
capacities and powers, which are more variable than the 
specific instincts in their manifestation in individuals. 

Among such qualities we may mention, as examples, 
the capacity for more than ordinary achievement in sci- 
ence, business, mathematics, politics, art, music, etc. 
These appear to be, in large part, innate mental tenden- 
cies, qualities, and capacities, which must be developed 
into capabilities through education. 

An instinct acquired during remote evolutionary ex- 
perience is a trace of that experience persisting in the 
mental and physical constitution of the individual. This 
innate trace of remote racial experience is comparable 
to a memory of the experience which is not recognized 
as a memory. Through these traces the lessons of past 
experience are indelibly impressed on the mental and 
physical constitution of the individual, and are operative 
in guiding him through present experience. 

It is possible, though most would deny that it is so, 
that there is, in the instinctive striving, some vague per- 
ception of the end at which the impulse aims. In the 
fear instinct such a preperception would take the form 
of a very imperfectly defined "Danger-there ! This way 
to escape!" The awareness of why the act is worth 
while could arise only through the awakening of innate 
knowledge, along with the innate feeling and impulse. 
At any rate there is certainly present the feeling that 



122 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

something worth while is being gained by the behavior. 
In the lower animals the instincts have been predeter- 
mined in mechanical perfection. As a result their capa- 
city for development is limited. The fact that the in- 
stincts are less perfectly developed in man has given him 
infinite possibilities of development. The fact that man's 
instincts are mainly directing tendencies, stimulates the 
development of the intellectual, feeling, and volitional 
processes as factors for guiding action. The intellect 
enables man to formulate aims and purposes and to select 
means for realizing them. It enables man to be guided 
by considerations of "in the long run" and "as a whole," 
rather than by immediate impulse. Social heredity sup- 
plements biological heredity in evolution. The social 
tradition is acquired through imitation and intelligent 
adaptation. 



CHAPTER XII. 

WILL TO LIVE 

In the earliest form of conscious life there was prob- 
ably a vague consciousness of impulsive-process-going-on, 
of satisfaction-accompanying-the-going-on. It was the 
will to live, seeking and finding satisfaction in the con- 
scious-impulsive-satisfying-activity which constituted the 
process of living. 

Through the process of evolution, the general will to 
gain satisfaction through carrying out impulse has come 
to manifest itself along many different lines. The vari- 
ous instinctive predispositions serve to guide impulsive 
activities into the lines along which they most profitably 
seek for satisfaction. They are differentiations of the 
original capacity to experience impulse and to feel satis- 
faction in carrying it out. They are lines along which 
the original capacity has been developed into more spe- 
cific capabilities. As such they must be dominated and 
correlated by the general will so that they will work to- 
gether harmoniously, each contributing duly to the sat- 
isfaction of all. The general will aims at a state of gen- 
eral well-being or self-realization. 

PREDISPOSITION TO SELF-REALIZATION 

We have found that we can trace one all-pervasive, 
all-inclusive predisposition manifesting itself in the vari- 

123 



124 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ous special instincts. We may call this the predisposi- 
tion to self-realization. It is essentially a process of seek- 
ing satisfaction through carrying out impulse. 

In one aspect the instincts are processes of reacting to 
the environment or of adjusting one's self to the environ- 
ment. The form of the reaction is determined by a cor- 
relation existing between certain objects of conscious- 
ness and certain qualities in the physical and mental con- 
stitution of the individual. Since the behavior is deter- 
mined in part by mental factors, it may be regarded as 
a form of self-expression. 

The instincts are predispositions to act in such ways 
as will best promote one's well-being or self-realization. 
The predisposition to self-realization works blindly at 
first, groping its way by mere impulse. As man's experi- 
ence widens and his intelligence increases, the character 
of this predominating predisposition becomes more clearly 
revealed. It develops into an ideal of well-being or self- 
realization. 

IDEAL OF SELF-REALIZATION 

The ideal of self-realization aims at a harmonious con- 
dition of well-being. This condition is to be attained by 
developing all one's capacities for securing satisfaction 
into capabilities, and by exercising these capabilities each 
with due regard for the other, and by safeguarding them. 

CLASSES OF INSTINCTS 

Instincts may be classified in accordance with certain 
general tendencies they manifest. 



CLASSES OF INSTINCTS 125 

Some of the instincts, such as constructiveness and ac- 
quisitiveness, aim at making the material environment 
contribute to well-being. 

Play, curiosity, and interest in the behavior of others 
aim at mastery of both the material and social environ- 
ments. 

Pugnacity, fear, self-assertion, rivalry, shyness, secre- 
tiveness are egoistic or self-seeking in their immediate 
aim, but they are also, indirectly, altruistic, as whatever 
rightly promotes the well-being of the individual also 
promotes the well-being of others. So while they are 
anti-social in certain respects, they are at the same time 
pro-social. 

Teasing and the predatory instinct are anti-social. 

The altruistic instincts are generally pro-social. That 
is they aim at the well-being of others. Such are parent- 
hood, sympathy, modesty, sexual love, respect for others, 
co-operation, gregariousness, loyalty and subordination 
to superiors. 

Many confuse altruistic instincts and interests with the 
moral interest. It is right to follow these impulses only 
when they are carried out with due regard to individual 
and social well-being. Moral acts are not merely mat- 
ters of following blind impulse. Moral acts require clear 
and penetrating discernment as to their effect on well- 
being. Hell is paved with good intentions. 

MAN IS A SOCIAL BEING 

The brief foregoing consideration of the tendencies of 
instincts must make it clear that man is by nature a so- 



126 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

cial being. Man can not come into being, or develop 
his capacities, apart from others. Born in collective life, 
man's well-being must be brought about through co- 
operation with others in collective life. 

The will to live in its various lines of instinctive devel- 
opment clearly aims at self-realization in the give and 
receive of association with others. The well-being aimed 
at is a condition of social well-being in which each will 
profit in proportion to his service to others, and only as 
he renders such services. One feels regard for the col- 
lective welfare, just as naturally as he does for his in- 
dividual welfare. The supreme good is a common good. 
It can be attained only in a community the members of 
which are mutually dependent and mutually helpful. 

Man is a social being, with broadly diversified inter- 
ests and concerns, as well as a marvelous machine for 
performing work. His well-being can be promoted only 
by providing opportunities and stimuli leading to the 
satisfaction of his various lines of interest, to be discussed 
later. This fact should be kept in mind in planning wel- 
fare work. 

The striving for self-realization is a striving for such a 
condition of collective well-being as we have just ex- 
plained. The ideal of self-realization has been formu- 
lated through co-operative experience and co-operative 
reflection on experience. It is an end not fully attain- 
able, but one to which we can always approach more 
closely. It is the moral ideal. 



MEANINGS OF INTEREST 127 

MEANINGS OF INTEREST 

The word interest is used in different senses. In the 
wider meaning of the term one is interested in all that 
concerns his need or welfare, though he may not be con- 
scious of the fact that he is concerned. In this sense in- 
terest is merely a name for the fact of the concern. 

In a narrow psychological sense one is said to be in- 
terested in anything to which he devotes his attention. In 
this sense one may be interested in doing a thing which 
is contrary to his interest in the previously mentioned 
meaning of the term. In this usage interest is synony- 
mous with attention. 

WHAT IS "AN INTEREST" ? 

An interest is a general notion or ideal of an end 
which one must strive to attain in order to promote well- 
being. It is the conception of an end which is satisfy- 
ing, and hence is desirable. An interest is a conscious 
realization that the things belonging to a general class 
concern one's need or well-being along a common line. 
Interests are habits of thinking, feeling emotion, and 
acting about things. The peculiar affective aspect, or 
emotional tone characteristic of an interest is a sentiment. 
It is the feeling of valuation which appraises a thing as a 
means of attaining the end at which the interest aims. 

The feeling of interest varies with the importance at- 
tributed to a thing as a means of affecting well-being 
favorably or unfavorably. 

The consciousness of favorable concern arouses a feel- 



128 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ing of pleasure, a foretaste of the satisfaction to be at- 
tained, and a striving or impulse to attain it. This com- 
plex state is known as a desire. 

The consciousness of unfavorable concern arouses a 
feeling of pain, a foretaste of dissatisfaction, and an im- 
pulse of aversion or striving away from. 

Man's superiority to the lower animals arises chiefly 
from his capacity for generalizing. He notices resemb- 
lances and differences. He arranges objects into classes 
according to their similarities of form, relationship, use, 
etc. The similarities do not need to be abstracted and 
generalized after the manner of formal logic. 

When a man encounters a situation in which he ob- 
serves aspects which bring it under a general class, he 
reacts to the situation in a way appropriate to the general 
class. A few general predispositions to behavior enable 
one to deal satisfactorily with many similar concrete situ- 
ations. 

The things which concern well-being similarly are ar- 
ranged in a general class. General lines of concern come 
to be recognized. Around each line of concern of which 
one becomes conscious is organized a system of tenden- 
cies to feel and act. The habit of responding to such a 
class of objects with co-ordinated tendencies to feel and 
act is known as an interest. When an interest has been 
formed, as soon as an object is recognized as belonging 
to the general class, it arouses the desire and impulse 
characteristic of the interest. 

Man grows gradually into a consciousness or realiza- 
tion that certain classes of things concern his well-being 



WHAT IS "AN INTEREST?" 129 

in certain ways. The ends toward which the instincts 
impel one come to be formulated as aims or purposes, 
and to be desired. 

The line which the development of the individual actu- 
ally follows is a resultant or mean of two component 
factors. The two factors determining development are in- 
stinctive endowment and educational influence. 

When the conscious realization of the concern is awak- 
ened, it takes the form known as interest. Conscious 
processes are interesting when some capacity of the self 
is finding satisfaction in the activities. 

Man is impelled to action through a conception of 
himself as satisfied as the result of the action. The fore- 
taste of satisfaction which arises from picturing or rep- 
resenting one's self as having gained the object or at- 
tained the interesting or desired end, arouses the impulse 
to the action, and leads to such a rearrangement of con- 
ditions as will bring about the anticipated satisfaction. 

MORAL INTEREST 

The moral interest is the dominant or normative in- 
terest. It is the interest which regards social well-being 
as the ideal or end to be attained. Social well-being is 
an harmonious co-ordination of individual well-beings. 
It is to be attained by efforts at self-realization in which 
services are received and rendered in due proportion. 

Moral acts are acts which affect the social well-being. 
Acts affect the social well-being directly when they di- 
rectly further or hinder the well-being of others. 

Acts which directly affect only the efficiency of the 



130 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

individual who performs them affect social well-being in- 
directly. Society must see that its various members ren- 
der the most efficient service they are capable of, just as 
a person must see to it that his various bodily organs are 
working properly. Hence society lays down rules to 
which the behavior of the individual must conform. 

The moral judgment appraises the tendency of acts to 
further or hinder individual and social well-being. The 
moral judgment is the judgment of society, which has 
followed and handed down in tradition the best judg- 
ments of the moral leaders of the past. This judgment 
voices the collective racial experience in regard to acts 
which tend to hinder or promote individual and social 
well-being. 

By our instinctive endowment we are sensitive to the 
praise and blame, or approval and disapproval of our 
fellows and conform largely to their will. Those who do 
not so conform are penalized in various ways. They 
come to feel that this judgment will be backed up with 
the force of an all-powerful will. The moral judgment 
is a judgment that "I ought to do this.'' 

Through suggestion and imitation we accept the max- 
ims and traditions in which are formulated the racial ex- 
perience as to what is good or bad. The moral judg- 
ment is a judgment that this way I will find the means 
to normal well-being. Normal well-being is well-being 
in which a proper balance is struck between individual 
interests and collective well-being. 

One gets his ideal of conduct as a suggestion from 
others. When he comes to see that this ideal aims at 



MORAL INTEREST 131 

the best co-ordination of individual and collective wel- 
fare he may strive to promote this welfare, regardless 
of the collective approval or disapproval of his acts. 

The moral interest is an interest in normal well-being 
or well-doing, as being is in this sense a process of doing. 
It is an interest in developing and exercising all one's 
interests, both egoistic and altruistic, so that they will 
contribute to social well-being. 

The moral interest has developed from innate or in- 
stinctive tendencies. The moral ideal may thus be con- 
ceived as developing from impulses and capacities which 
have their origin in the eternal consciousness of the 
Divine Spirit which is immanent in us. Religion is self- 
subjection to the Divine Will. This self -subjection is 
manifested in morality.* 

All things have their being in the Universal Will to 
Live. In us, the impulsive force of this Will becomes 
manifested along the lines of various instinctive ten- 
dencies. In our conscious experience we become aware 
of these native impulses and capacities. As experience 
develops, intelligence furnishes guidance in efforts to seek 
satisfaction for them. But the form into which the moral 
personality develops is determined largely by social agen- 
cies. 



*Statements in regard to the relation of man to the "Di- 
vine Spirit," etc., are based on Metaphysical inferences. 
Strictly speaking, they have no place in a discussion of sci- 
entific principles. 



CHAPTER XIII 

CLASSIFICATION OF INTERESTS 

The interests are the ends which the instincts serve, 
brought into clear consciousness and developed into 
habitual lines of desiring and striving. 

The various instincts previously enumerated become 
interests when the individual gains an understanding of 
the end which they serve and tries to find means adapted 
to attain the end. 

In the fully developed consciousness, an interest as a 
motive impelling to action will have two aspects. In 
one aspect, it is an interest in a special line of activity. 
In another aspect, the special line of interest is a mani- 
festation of the all-inclusive interest in attaining self- 
realization in a state of social well-being. 

The experience of the race in working out the due cor- 
relation and co-ordination of the various interests has 
found that they can be dealt with most conveniently when 
they are grouped in a few important classes. 

The all pervading and all inclusive interest in self- 
realization manifests itself in the moral interest. The 
moral interest is interest in correlating and co-ordinating 
the various lines of interest. 

The general lines of interest include politico-legal, phil- 
anthropy, family and home, sociability, health, knowledge 
and educational skill, wealth, beauty, vocation, and rec- 
reation. 

132 



CLASSIFICATION OF INTERESTS 133 

MORALITY — THE MAJOR INTEREST 

The moral interest aims at a social well-being to be 
brought about by an harmonious co-ordination of indi- 
vidual well-beings. It is an interest in developing and 
exercising all one's interests, both egoistic and altruis- 
tic, so that they will contribute most effectively to social 
well-being. 

The sentiments which attach themselves to the behav- 
ior with which the moral interest is concerned, are feel- 
ings of oughtness or obligation. The feeling of obliga- 
tion is aroused when acts are classified as right or wrong, 
and things as good or bad. 

The feelings of rightness and wrongness attach them- 
selves to acts which tend to further or hinder normal 
well-being. These feelings are manifested, at first, as 
blind instinctive impulses. They predispose one to do 
the right or good act, and not to do the wrong one. 

Through educational development, which is guided by 
social influences, the feelings of obligation tend to lose 
their blind instinctive character. As experience devel- 
ops, one gains the ability to appraise the tendency of acts 
to hinder or further well-being. Wrong acts are seen to 
be acts which have bad results. Right acts are those 
which bring good results. However the obligation feel- 
ings to which judgments of rightness and wrongness give 
rise, still retain their instinctively imperative character. 
Virtuous and vicious describe qualities of character. 

Goodness means fitness to promote well-being. A 
thing is good only as it is good for something. Good- 



134 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ness can be estimated only in relation to the end to be 
served. Good and bad things are things which have a 
favorable or unfavorable bearing on well-being. 

The enlightened conscience aims at a progressively 
realized state of well-being to be brought about through 
a happy adjustment, or co-ordination and satisfaction, of 
the egoistic interests which have regard for self, and of 
the altruistic interests which have regard for others. It 
aims to harmonize the various interests of the individual 
and the interests of society, so as to achieve a higher 
and richer life for all. Conscience aims to bring the be- 
havior of the individual into harmony with the collective 
or social will, and with the Universal Will of which it 
is a manifestation. 

Moral principles arise from the recognition that acts 
concern both individual and social well-being. They are 
general principles to which acts must conform in order 
to promote this well-being. They lay down rules for 
playing the game of life. The moral virtues are habits 
of acting in accordance with moral principles. 

The principles, to which acts should conform in order 
that they may be regarded as moral, include, among 
others, those of honesty, truthfulness, fidelity, loyalty, 
justice, mercy, courage, industry, thrift, frugality, tem- 
perance, chastity, etc. They are the principles by which 
impulses to action along the lines of the various inter- 
ests should be appraised to see whether they should be 
carried out, or held in check, or strengthened, or re- 
enforced. 



INTERESTS 135 

PHILANTHROPY INTEREST 

From the various predispositions to perform actions 
which promote the well-being of others has developed 
the interest in philanthrophy. This interest has its roots 
in gregariousness, the tender emotion, affection, sympa- 
thy, co-operation, loyalty to group interests, filial devo- 
tion, respect for others, self-subjection, etc. It is the 
interest in rendering social service for which no service, 
or means of securing service, is to be received in ex- 
change. This distinguishes it from business which is 
rendering service for a fair consideration. 

Manv confuse philanthropy with the moral interest. 
However, philanthropy is merely one among several lines 
of interest with which the moral interest is concerned. 
The philanthropy interest must be co-ordinated and cor- 
related with the politico-legal, sociability, family and 
home, health, education, wealth, vocation, beauty, and 
recreation interests in accordance with moral principles. 
One is under a moral obligation to develop and exercise 
his own capabilities along all these lines. Through the 
exercise of the philanthropy interest thus imposed upon 
him, he is to provide that others have opportunity, means 
and incentive to develop their interests along the same 
lines. The moral interest is co-extensive with life in- 
terests. 

POLITICO-LEGAL INTEREST 

The political interest aims to render service to the in- 
dividual and to society through organized co-operative 



136 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

effort. The political organization is the machinery em- 
ployed for rendering this service. The legal interest 
aims through the instrumentality of legislation to enact 
the laws which will establish the form of political organ- 
ization which will be most efficient in promoting indi- 
vidual and collective well-being through co-operative ef- 
fort. 

The legal interest also aims to make laws which re- 
cord the consensus of moral judgment, to establish judi- 
cial machinery to apply this judgment to concrete cases, 
and to provide for executives to enforce the judicial de- 
cisions. The judicial machinery is established to admin- 
ister justice. Justice requires that benefits and oppor- 
tunities for satisfaction be fairly apportioned among all. 

FAMILY AND HOME INTEREST 

The family interest aims at promoting the various in- 
terests of those for whom conjugal, or parental, or filial 
love exists. 

The members of the family are interested in the home 
as a means of satisfying a great variety of interests. The 
home interest embraces all the activities which aim at 
the well-being of the members of the home, and all the 
things with which these activities are concerned. 

The home interest is concerned with the various things 
pertaining to domestic economy and domestic art. Among 
them are wholesome and appetizing food, architecture, 
heating, ventilating, lighting, decorations, furniture, and 
various forms of household activities which it is hardly 
necessary to mention. 



FAMILY AND HOME INTEREST 137 

Service to the family and home is the vocation of a 
large number of women. It also makes large demands 
on women who have other vocations, and on all normal 
men. 

SOCIABILITY INTEREST 

This interest impels one to strive to secure personal 
recognition along social, civic, political, business, philan- 
thropy and other lines. It is the interest manifested in 
the quest for fame, honor, power, position, influence, so- 
cial standing. It gives rise to the ambition to be esteemed 
and reckoned with by one's fellows. The desire for mere 
notoriety is a perversion of this interest. 

Whatever gives one advantage in competition with 
others, or in influencing and leading others, or makes him 
looked up to, admired or considered by others, appeals 
to this interest, and will be desired when the social ad- 
vantage to be secured by means of it is made clear. 

For example, a new fashion is taken up mainly as a 
means of securing social recognition, or prestige. What 
makes one appear well dressed is desired as a means of 
securing recognition from his business associates. 

Posting the names and records of the men who do 
the most effective work in a factory, may stimulate others 
to do much better work in order to secure such recog- 
nition. This appeals to the instincts of emulation, riv- 
alry, and self-assertion, which are elements of the so- 
ciability interest. 

HEALTH INTEREST 

The health interest attaches itself to any thing which 



138 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

prevents or cures disease, or prevents accident. It aims 
at the satisfaction to be derived from keeping the body 
in efficient working condition. It is concerned with 
wholesome food, water, light, ventilation, dwelling place, 
conditions of labor, physical culture, athletics, etc. 

EDUCATION INTEREST 

The education interest is concerned with whatever in- 
creases knowledge or wisdom, or makes for efficiency in 
economic, social, or political activities, or enlightens one 
as to a better means of self-realization along any line of 
interest. It makes for culture as its ideal. Culture is 
knowledge, appreciation, and utilization of the things 
which give enduring satisfaction. 

Curiosity, or interest in knowing, has led to the ex- 
ploration of the material and social environment, for the 
purpose of securing information about it; regardless of 
whether this knowledge offers promise of being imme- 
diately or remotely of practical value. One in whom 
this impulse is active will store up much knowledge, 
some of which may later prove to be of practical value in 
a way not foreseen at the time it was acquired. In its 
highest form of development, curiosity takes the form 
of a quest for scientific knowledge. 

AESTHETIC INTEREST 

This is generally known as the interest in beauty. It 
is concerned with such things as the theater, literature, 
music, painting, sculpture, architecture, landscape gar- 
dening, beautifying the person, the home, and its fur- 



ESTHETIC INTEREST 139 

nishings and surroundings and with the beauty of natural 
objects, etc. 

WEALTH INTEREST 

The wealth interest aims at mastery of the material 
environment. Whatever increases ability to earn money, 
or save money, or reduces expenses, appeals to this in- 
terest. 

It is a narrow, superficial, and false ideal which makes 
the pursuit of wealth the supreme end in life. The at- 
tainment of wealth is not a criterion of a successful life. 

The amount of wealth secured is only one among sev- 
eral elements which must be taken into account in esti- 
mating business success. The amount of wealth ac- 
cumulated may be taken as a measure of business suc- 
cess, only when it represents a fair return for services 
rendered. 

Acquiring wealth without rendering adequate service 
in return for it is exploitation. It departs from the prin- 
ciple of the square deal and is bad business. 

The attainment of business success is only one element 
involved in attaining broad human success. The attain- 
ment of wealth is desirable only as a means of satisfac- 
tion along other lines of self-realization. 

Two motives contribute largely to the performance of 
the economic activities of business. One motive is to 
procure the means of satisfying, not only the wealth 
interest of the worker, but also his sociability, health, 
educational, aesthetic, recreational and politico-legal in- 
terests. 



140 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

The other motive is to meet adequately the demands 
for service to the well-being of others, which the busi- 
ness aims to satisfy. This is the vocational interest. 

VOCATION INTEREST 

The vocation interest is interest in rendering to others 
service which will promote their well-being. It is close- 
ly related to the wealth interest. It aims to make the 
rendering of service to others a means of securing the 
things which will promote one's own well-being. The 
two interests working together aim at a mutually advan- 
tageous exchange of services or of the means of secur- 
ing service. . 

Everyone may rightly demand the satisfaction of his 
own interest in well-being, provided he renders an equiv- 
alent service in promoting the well-being of others. 

Most people are under the necessity of making a liv- 
ing in order that they may be able to meet their obliga- 
tions to enrich the well-being of themselves and others. 
Vocational activities are directed along certain specific 
lines largely as a result of the fact that efforts to satisfy 
needs must be concentrated along rather narrow lines 
in order that they may become efficient and deserve and 
receive reward. 

Work which is taken up merely because it affords an 
opportunity to make a living may lack qualities very 
essential to the satisfaction of the vocational interest. 
In order to gain due satisfaction for the vocational in- 
terest, one should specialize his efforts along some line 
in which he feels he is rendering value received to others, 



VOCATION INTEREST 141 

in return for the compensation he receives for his work. 
Vocation should be chosen along lines of fitness to serve, 
not merely along lines in which it is possible that the 
greatest financial return may be secured for serving. 

The feeling that the activities are worth while helps 
to make them interesting. The satisfaction that comes 
from doing well, things that are worth while, is one of 
the greatest rewards that service can gain. 

Vocation means a calling to render service to others 
along the line for which one's abilities best fit him. Choos- 
ing a vocation is selecting and devoting one's self to ac- 
tivities one feels called upon to perform. To be truly 
vocational the activities should be interesting. The 
achievement of their end should bring satisfaction. The 
greatest source of lasting happiness is an occupation 
which meets the demands of one's nature, and in which 
one's aptitudes and abilities fit him to be successful in 
rendering service to others. 

Work, which really meets the demand of the vocational 
interest, may at first be neutral in feeling tone, or even 
distasteful. Yet, if the occupation as a whole is really 
felt to be worth while, much of the work will take on 
an acquired interest. It is more than likely that some 
distasteful or painful activities will be involved in any 
line of work, even though, as a whole, it satisfies the 
vocation interest. 

When one has chosen his vocation, he should say to 
himself, "This is my job. It is up to me to do it, or to 
be done for. I will do it." 

Practical necessity usually compels one to confine his 



142 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

vocational activities to a rather narrow line. His voca- 
tion can not afford satisfaction along all the lines of his 
interests. It must be regarded as the means of secur- 
ing that which can be used to gain satisfaction along 
avocational lines. 

One's vocational activities do not completely fulfill his 
obligations to render service to others. Part of one's 
serious efforts at self-realization must be devoted to ren- 
dering service to others, for which the only compensa- 
tion is the satisfaction resulting from the consciousness 
of having rendered the service. One must thus render 
service to others as individuals and as members of fam- 
ily, political, civic, and other social groups. In so do- 
ing he is exercising his philanthropy interest. 

To successfully perform serious work of the more im- 
portant sort, intense voluntary concentration must be 
maintained for a considerable period of time. Such work 
involves dealing with theoretical or practical problems 
which must be solved in order to promote well-being. 
The problem may be concerned with adapting or em- 
ploying external means to satisfy a felt need. Or the 
problem may be of the intellectual sort which aims at 
satisfying the felt need for orderliness and consistency 
in our knowledge. 

Being thwarted in the solution of a problem gives dis- 
pleasure and adds to the fatigue of the work. A satis- 
factory solution of the problem, or the consciousness of 
progress toward a solution, gives pleasure. Such pleasure 
plays a wholesome part in the economy of life. 

Even when work is rich in the amount of such pleasure 



WORK AND NEED FOR RECREATION 143 

it gives, it finally becomes fatiguing and demands periods 
for recuperation and recreation. The fatigue and the 
need for means of recuperation are much greater in 
lines of work which are largely routine and disagree- 
able in character. 

WORK AND THE NEED FOR RECREATION 

Any serious effort at self-realization is work. One is 
working just as truly when he devotes himself to philan- 
thropic service as he is when pursuing his vocation. 

Work that is full of interest and pleasure finally be- 
comes fatiguing and demands periods for recreation. 
Life grows wearisome, as it follows the daily grind of 
routine in shop or store or home, even if the occupation, 
on the whole, is congenial. If work is persisted in too 
long without interruption, it may grow repulsive. 

The dull rounds of monotonous toil become deaden- 
ing in their humdrum influence. One may become so 
desperate as to be ready to resort even to crime to break 
the monotony, if no other means is available. Even if 
leisure is provided for rest and sleep, they alone are not 
sufficient to restore the exhausted energies of one em- 
ployed in the more deadening occupations. Such a per- 
son can not come back to work with a wholesome feel- 
ing, unless some form of recreation is provided. 

One regularly employed even at a congenial occupa- 
tion, will have many interests not sufficiently exercised in 
his ordinary work. He will become conscious of the 
need of satisfying these interests. 

The brain cells corresponding to various developed in- 



144 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

terests should be stimulated to use up the accumulated 
energy. In this way alone the capacity for supplying 
energy can be kept in efficient working. Disuse results 
in atrophy, or wasting away of capacity. 

A disagreeable emotional tone arises from developed 
interests which are denied wholesome stimulation and 
satisfaction. A similar feeling results from interests so 
stimulated that an undue amount of energy is used up. 

An unpleasant emotional tone, arising from under or 
over stimulated interests, spreads a disagreeable feeling 
over vocational or avocational activities which otherwise 
would have an agreeable tone. When work is monoton- 
ous or disagreeable,the unpleasant feeling so aroused 
may add to the dislike for it to such an extent as to make 
it practically unbearable. 

PLAY INSTINCT AND THE RECREATION INTEREST 

Three factors are manifested in play activities. In 
play surplus energy is used up. Instinctive ancestral ac- 
tivities are rehearsed. The behavior of others is imi- 
tated. 

Nervous energy stored up in excess leads to discom- 
fort. Such energy tends to discharge itself into action. 
The repression of the discharge is disagreeable. The ac- 
tivities resulting from such discharge are pleasurable. 
These activities are often aimless. In that case they ap- 
parently serve no purpose except that of keeping alive 
and exercising and developing the ability to function. 

Much of the excess or accumulated energy discharged 
in play is that of the nerve cells which supply the impul- 
sive nervous energy manifested in instinctive actions. 



PLAY INSTINCT 145 

When the nervous organization underlying instinctive 
acts has developed, a strong impulse to perform the acts 
arises. 

In these instincts ancestral activities recur. These ac- 
tivities formerly served to adjust the individual, more or 
less directly, to his environment. 

As the result of changing conditions much of the im- 
mediate practical value of many instincts has been lost. 
However, the child's tendency to imitate in his play the 
behavior of those around him has done much to adjust 
him to his life conditions. 

No doubt, in the human race, more or less educationl 
guidance has always been exercised to develop instincts 
into forms having practical value. Under modern condi- 
tions the need for such guidance is still more imperative. 
They must be considerably transformed to give them the 
greatest practical value. 

The intelligent play director or supervisor performs a 
very important educational work. The effectiveness with 
which these play activities prepare one to deal with his 
material and social environment depends upon the intel- 
ligence with which the development of the instincts is 
fostered by educational influences. 

Many instincts are fostered and guided in play activi- 
ties. Among them are imitation, curiosity, acquisitive- 
ness, constructiveness, self-assertion, self -subjection, ri- 
valry, pugnacity, gregariousness, affection, loyalty, sym- 
pathy, hunting, predatory, migratory, etc. Fear, anger, 
envy, jealousy and self-conceit are largely eliminated 
or brought under proper control. 



146 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

When these propensities to action are denied appro- 
priate expression, a feeling of boredom, uneasiness, irri- 
tability, and craving for excitement develops. When 
proper channels of expression are denied, there is a tend- 
ency for them to seek outlet in abnormal and unwhole- 
some directions. 

Few of the fundamental instincts could be entirely elim- 
inated without working great detriment to the individual 
and society. 

The chief task of the educator is to direct the expres- 
sion of the instincts into lines that will be useful to the 
individual and to society. The mind may be so filled 
with wholesome things that there is no place left for 
the unwholesome to develop. For example, nearly all 
the instincts can find wholesome forms of expression in 
athletic sports. 

The co-operative sports in which teams are engaged 
help to develop a social consciousness and a self-sacri- 
ficing social sentiment. General emotional attitudes are 
developed that are transferable to lines of activity other 
than sport. Some group plays have a dramatic or 
aesthetic appeal. 

RECREATION INTEREST 

In the recreation interest the play instinct of childhood 
has survived and developed into a form which meets the 
needs of mature life. The adult's pleasures grow through 
a process of development from the pleasures of child- 
hood and youth. Unless the foundation laid in early 



RECREATION INTEREST 147 

years is broad, and strong, and varied, the pleasures of 
the adult will be lacking in richness and diversity. 

Amateur athletics are athletics engaged in as an avo- 
cational rather than as a vocational interest. The activ- 
ities aim directly at securing pleasure or recreation rather 
than at rendering service to others. 

"Sport for sport's sake" is the cardinal and life-giving 
principle of amateur athletics. This may be generalized 
into "Recreational activities for their own sake." 

Exercise which does not have an immediately interest- 
ing and satisfying quality lacks what is essential to give 
it recreational value. Gymnastics imposed on one for 
health's sake only, and directed in a mechanical and un- 
interesting way, may on that account have little real 
value in restoring a healthful tone to mind and body. 

The recreation interest plays a very important part in 
the activities of a well-ordered life. This interest de- 
mands that vocational and avocational work must not be 
allowed to fill all one's time. There must be time to en- 
gage in the satisfaction of other interests. One must 
also have opportunity and proper stimulus and incen- 
tive to insure the exercise of otherwise neglected inter- 
ests. 

Recreation may be satisfactory in character though it 
does not fully exercise all the interests outside the regu- 
lar lines of work. Practical considerations generally 
make it necessary to seek recreation along rather narrow 
lines of interest. The instinctive impulses leading to 
recreational activities thus become systematized by habit 
along special lines such as the theater, music, art, liter- 



148 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ature, travel, games, sports, dancing, social functions, 
study, forms of manual work, etc. 

Recreational activities should appeal to interests not 
stimulated satisfactorily in ordinary work. They should 
have the character of novelty and contrast when com- 
pared with the regular vocational and avocational work. 

Recreational pursuits should arouse adequate but not 
excessive activity. They should give rise to a pleasur- 
able feeling which tends to persist as a permanent emo- 
tional tone. Recreation should also provide for exercise 
fitted to keep the body in good working condition. 

The agreeable emotional tone aroused by activities 
which meet these requirements will displace the disagree- 
able feelings resulting from the deadening routine of 
work, or from fatigue, or from lack of proper exercise 
and satisfaction of developed interests. The pleasurable 
feeling pervades the conscious processes involved in or- 
dinary work, and adds to the efficiency of the efforts. 

Proper recreational activities facilitate the gaining of 
energy during the periods of rest, and create conditions 
favorable to the performance of the various physiological 
functions which make one efficient. To be classed prop- 
erly as recreational, activities must re-create, or create 
again, one's powers of body and mind. 

Exercising interests involved in regular work, but 
along different lines, may be recreative in character. The 
professional baseball player may thus find recreation in 
playing golf. One whose work is routine and not too 
fatiguing may seek recreation in matters involving close 



RECREATION INTEREST 149 

concentration of the attention and sustained mental effort, 
and vice versa. 

The instinctive demand for recreation is one of na- 
ture's provisions for keeping alive and developing 
through exercise capacities that would otherwise die. It 
is also a provision for renewing the waning powers of 
mind and body, and keeping one's working efficiency up 
to the standard. The recreation interest aims at nov- 
elty, contrast through change of scene or form of activ- 
ity, restoration of mental and physical energy used up by 
serious work, and the displacement of a disagreeable, or 
neutral, or less pleasurable feeling by a pleasurable emo- 
tional tone ; all of which tends to bring about a well- 
founded assurance of mental and physical fitness. 

The gregarious instinct is a strong impelling force in 
choosing the forms of recreation. It leads one to seek 
his recreation in the company of others. The sympa- 
thetic instinct also leads one to seek to share the emotions 
of others and to share his emotions with them. 

The recreation interest may be concerned with satis- 
fying one, or several of the other interests previously 
mentioned. The end to be gained in doing a thing as a 
means of satisfying the recreation interest is different 
from the end sought in exercising the interest as part of 
the regular work of life. Yet one can often make much 
of his daily work recreative in character. 

CORRELATION AND CO-ORDINATION OF INTERESTS 

Every one has philanthropy, politico-legal, sociability, 
health, education, wealth, beauty, vocation, recreation, 



150 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

and family and home interests. He also has a moral in- 
terest which impels him to strive for an harmonious self- 
realization along the lines of all these interests. He is 
under obligation to have due regard for the other inter- 
ests while seeking satisfaction for any particular interest. 

Of course one may not fulfill his obligation. As a re- 
sult of deficiency in natural endowment or of imperfect 
educational development, one may not strive for the sat- 
isfaction of his various interests in such a way that each 
will contribute its part, harmoniously with the others, to 
the promotion of complete self-realization. 

One may not have shown due regard for his interests 
in choosing and pursuing his vocation. He may be held 
by deeply ingrained habit to seek excessive satisfaction 
for certain interests. In such a case certain interests will 
have been neglected so that they have not developed prop- 
erly, or so that they have died out from lack of exercise. 

Health or philanthropy may be knowingly disregarded 
in the struggle for wealth or pleasure. Or one may strug- 
gle according to his light, but he may not be fully awak- 
ened, (or he may have gone to sleep) to the importance 
of the realization of his interest in certain lines. One may 
be alive to the importance of physical well-being, yet he 
may not clearly realize the importance of a certain fac- 
tor as a means of impairing or improving physical effi- 
ciency. 

Success in attaining satisfaction for one's vocational 
interest in a business, professional, scientific, artistic, po- 
litical, or other career, can be secured only through a 



RECREATION INTEREST 151 

long continued concentrated process of thinking and 
striving. 

The aim in the background of consciousness holds one 
continuously to a definite line of effort. The satisfac- 
tion resulting from a partial success achieved, and the 
foretaste of a fuller satisfaction to be obtained from the 
still greater success one believes he can achieve, spur one 
on to greater and more concentrated effort. One sets 
his eye on the end to be reached. Stimulated rather than 
daunted by obstacles he struggles on unrelentingly tp- 
ward his goal. 

The business one builds up in this way becomes flesh 
of his flesh and blood of his blood. It grows to be an- 
other part of himself. Such an one is always in danger 
of becoming intolerant of interest in everything which 
does not pertain to his business. He is hypnotized by 
concentrating his attention on the fascinating lure of great 
vocational success. 

One is justified in making his vocation a major inter- 
est in life. But he is ever in danger that his vision will 
be so short in range and narrow in scope that he will 
wake up some day to the fact that he has been making 
merely the means for securing a living. He may come 
to realize, when it is too late, that he has lost for all time 
the greater opportunity of making a life rich in the nobler, 
more significant, more abiding elements of joyous satis- 
faction. 

Such a man has become hardened, narrowed, and un- 
sympathetic. He has failed to gain the satisfaction to be 
derived from disinterestedly serving the well-being of 



152 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

others, from unselfish friendship, from broad interest in 
learning, in literature, art, health, and life-giving recre- 
ation. 

The supreme interest in life is the interest in symmetri- 
cal, harmonious, many-sided development known as self- 
realization. One should be ever on his guard against ex- 
alting into a position of supreme, if not sole importance, 
one of the interests which should really be subsidiary to 
the interest in being a fully developed person. In the 
strenuous drive for great achievement, interests of vital 
importance are likely to become stunted or atrophied, be- 
cause they have no chance to develop through exercise. 
Eternal vigilance and effort alone will enable one to 
avoid sacrificing the richer and nobler self on the altar 
of a narrow success. 

While many fail in this way, many more fail because 
they weakly follow the course of least resistance. They 
take a spineless, purposeless, attitude toward life. They 
need to feel the spur of a great ambition. 

TEMPERANCE AND DISSIPATION 

A man is temperate when he does not seek satisfac- 
tion for any interest or desire in excess of what is con- 
sistent with general well-being, not when he abstains 
from seeking any satisfaction. Dissipation is the seeking 
of satisfaction in excess of what is consistent with well- 
being. One can, for example, be just as dissipated in 
seeking wealth as he can in squandering it. 



CHAPTER XIV 

CAUSE, MOTIVE, PURPOSE, INTENTION, AND EFFECT 

The cause of an action is the circumstances from which 
it springs. 

The motive or purpose is the satisfying end aimed at, 
or the aim one strives to attain. The intention of the 
act includes all the effects one foresees as following from 
his endeavor. The effect or result generally includes 
consequences not embraced by the intention. The mo- 
tives of intelligent acts have their origin in the instinctive 
tendencies previously discussed. Under the moulding 
influence of educational forces instincts develop into in- 
terest as was previously explained. 

INTEREST, DESIRE AND AVERSION 

In a psychological sense an interest is a conscious real- 
ization that a thing concerns one's well-being. One is 
interested in a thing when he feels the need either of 
securing it as a means of satisfying one of his capabili- 
ties, or of striving away from it as a thing harmful to 
his well-being. The fact that the interest is felt is evi- 
dence that one believes he is concerned. If the belief is 
seen to be warranted, desire or aversion is aroused. 

Desire is a process of striving for a means of securing 
satisfaction. Aversion is a process of striving away from 
what causes dissatisfaction. 

153 



154 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

The intellect is the means by which motives or desires 
are guided to action. The function of the intellect is to 
devise ways and means for avoiding dissatisfaction and 
for securing satisfaction. It enables one to be guided by 
considerations of "in the long run" and "as a whole," 
rather than by immediate impulse. 

Interests are habits of attending, thinking, feeling de- 
sire or aversion and striving away from or striving to- 
ward certain classes of objects. 

A desire is both a painful sense of something lacking 
and a foretaste of the satisfaction which will be derived 
from securing the thing which will supply the lack. The 
foretaste of satisfaction is usually the more prominent 
or focal element of the desire. In this case the painful 
element will be found occupying a more or less promi- 
nent place in the margin. However, the painful element 
may be in the focus and the pleasure to be gained in the 
margin of consciousness. Each heightens the other by 
way of contrast. Both together give strength to the 
desire. 

The fact that these contrasting elements of "striving 
away from" and "striving toward" are at least potentially 
present in every state of desire is brought out more clear- 
ly by consideration of the many pairs of contrasting 
terms in common use in regard to objects of desire. The 
following given as illustrations will be clearly under- 
stood, without comment: 

Right — wrong, good — bad, striving toward — striv- 
ing away from, self-preservation — destruction, life — 
death, health — disease, knowledge — ignorance, effi- 



INTEREST, DEvSIRE AND AVERSION 155 

ciency — inefficiency, social recognition — lack of regard, 
satisfaction, beauty — ugliness, recreation — boredom, en- 
nui, pleasure — pain, gain — loss, wealth — poverty, good 
reputation — bad reputation, hope — despair, safe — unsafe, 
credit — discredit, love — hate, security — risk, success — fail- 
ure, comfort — discomfort, convenience — inconvenience, 
wholesome — unwholesome, advantage — disadvantage, se- 
curity — risk, sound — unsound, neatness — slovenliness, 
freedom — restraint, attraction — repulsion, favor — dis- 
favor. 

AROUSING DESIRE 

Success in arousing desire depends on finding what 
interests are concerned with the thing so that an appeal 
may be directed to them in such a way as to arouse de- 
sire. 

No matter what importance or lack of importance the 
various interests may have in the view of any particular 
individual, they are the springs and the only springs which 
impel him to action. 

The interests alone give motive force to action. They 
are to human behavior what the spring is to the watch, 
the steam to the engine, or the current to the dynamo. 

If certain interests have no importance to a person he 
can not be aroused to effort to satisfy them. He may ap- 
pear to do so for some ulterior reason, as some are sup- 
posed to attend grand opera and art exhibits to keep up 
appearances. In this case the impelling motive is not 
aesthetic or educational interest ; it is merely the sociabil- 



156 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ity interest manifesting itself in a desire for prestige.* 
Efficiency in influencing men in any line of activity will 
depend upon wisdom in discerning what interests to ap- 
peal to, and on skill in choice and use of means in mak- 
ing the appeal. 

AROUSING DESIRE ILLUSTRATED BY SALESMANSHIP 

Success in selling depends largely on finding what in- 
terests of the consumer are concerned with the goods so 
that an appeal may be directed to them in such a way as 
to arouse desire. It will depend also on the wisdom 
shown in selecting the qualities of the article which give 
it value as a means of satisfying desire and in skill in 
presenting these value-giving qualities in such a way as 
to create desire for the article. 

No desire to possess a thing can be aroused unless 
an appeal is made to some form in which one of the in- 
stinctive or developed interests is manifested. 

When an interest exists vividly in the psychological 
sense, that is when one is keenly conscious of the need, 
all that is required to arouse desire is to show that the 
thing is serviceable and available as a means of satisfy- 
ing the need. 

When the interest exists merely in the broader sense 
in which the fact of the need is not recognized, the sales- 
man's task is to make clear the extent to which the well- 
being is concerned with the thing offered for sale. The 

^Adapting the appeal or the solicitation to the interest 
will be discussed more fully in the "Psychology of Adver- 
tising." See also "Psychology of Salesmanship." 



AROUSING DESIRE 157 

salesman must determine whether it will be advantageous 
to awaken the impulse of striving away from the unsat- 
isfactory condition as well as the impulse of striving to 
gain the satisfaction to be secured by making the pur- 
chase. 

When the demand already exists but the sense of some- 
thing lacking is a familiar and tolerated sore, it may be 
necessary to dig into the tender spot and irritate it afresh, 
to give it potency in impelling to action. People become 
dulled and apathetic to old needs which they have had 
little hope of being able to satisfy. To arouse such a 
person to action one must not merely kindle the hope 
anew. He must reawaken keen antipathy to the evil 
which has come to be regarded as necessary, and to be 
ignored. He must also awaken a foretaste of the satis- 
faction to be gained by securing the article. He will then 
have created a desire in which impulses are both push- 
ing and pulling one to buy the thing. 

A desire is an impulse to action as well as a feeling. 
The impulse is carried out into action when one sees his 
way clear to satisfying the interest from which the feeling 
and impulse arise. 

The means of satisfying a need is a want. Desire and 
want and demand and supply are similar pairs of simi- 
larly related terms. 

The particular things with which the various instincts 
and interests are concerned will be discussed more fully 
in the "Psychology of Advertising." So will the vari- 
ous instincts and interests which may be appealed to most 
effectively in selling various things. See also the adapt- 



158 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ing of the selling appeal to the existing form of the in- 
terest. 

INTEREST, DESIRE, VALUE, AND PRICE 

Social value is the measure of the serviceability of the 
thing as a means of promoting well-being. 

The economic value of a thing is the measure of its 
power to stimulate desire. The economic value is in har- 
mony with the social value when the desire aroused does 
not lead one to make undue sacrifice of satisfaction for 
other interests, in order to obtain the desired thing. A 
thing has normal value when its economic and social 
value agree. 

Articles of commerce are produced not merely in or- 
der that a profit may be made from them. They are pro- 
duced in order that they may render service in satisfying 
needs. Articles are produced to render service in order 
that they may be exchanged for serviceable things, or for 
the means of securing service. 

The desires have normal strength and the values attri- 
buted to the things are normal values, when they are pro- 
portional to the various services the desired things will 
render in promoting well-being, or harmonious self-real- 
ization, in which all lines of interest are satisfied in due 
proportion. Desire and valuation are subnormal if they 
fall short when measured by this standard. They are in- 
flated when they are in excess of what is required for 
self-realization. Desire and valuation are perverted when 
the thing does not contribute to self-realization. 

The intrinsic value of a thing can not be made the 



VALUE AND PRICE 159 

basis for determining the price which may be rightly or 
fairly asked for it. A man of great wealth might con- 
ceivably be placed in circumstances such that a drink of 
water, or a supply of fresh air or something to eat would 
be of more value to him than all his wealth. In such a 
case one who supplied the need would not be justified in 
requiring all his wealth in exchange for it, if supplying 
it involved very slight sacrifice. One who supplies a 
need is entitled to payment, not in proportion to the ex- 
tent of the need, but in proportion to the sacrifice of sat- 
isfaction he is required to make in rendering the service. 

The price asked should not be in proportion to the 
value of the serviceable thing offered for sale. It should 
be estimated rather on a basis of securing a fair return 
for all that is contributed in the way of service in mak- 
ing the serviceable thing available. Such contributions 
may be made in preparing the raw material, and in the in- 
dustrial processes of manufacturing it, in furnishing capi- 
tal to carry on the industry, and ability to organize and 
manage it, or in transporting or selling the raw material 
and finished product. All who render service in any of 
these lines are entitled to fair compensation. Price should 
be based on the cost of producing and marketing, and 
should allow a fair margin of profit to all who render 
service in these lines. All parties to the exchange should 
profit by the transaction. 

Price not based fairly on service rendered in produc- 
ing and marketing has been inflated through control or 
reduced through competition. It is extortion, exploita- 
tion, or perversion, and is fraudulent, if through mon- 



160 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

opolistic combination, or other acts in restraint of trade, 
or through misrepresentation or over-persuasion in sell- 
ing, one exacts an unfair margin of profit. See "Truth- 
fulness in Selling" in Psychology of Salesmanship. 

STANDARD OF LIVING 

The standard of living is the degree and quality of 
satisfaction habitually allotted tx> the various interests. 
The level at which the standard is fixed is influenced 
largely by imitation of the feelings, customs, and opin- 
ions of others through social influences, and by the eco- 
nomic means available for satisfying the desires. 

Like other matters of habit, the standard of living does 
not change readily. When men have become accustomed 
to desiring only certain conveniences of living, and fami- 
liar varieties of food, etc., it takes strong reason and 
strong stimulus to get them out of their well-worn ruts. 
Desire must be excited to sufficient strength to break the 
tightly binding fetters of long standing habit. Some- 
times this may be done by showing the advantage the 
new thing offers, in consequence of being a better means 
than the familiar one of satisfying some previously ex- 
isting desire. See the "Psychology of Advertising" for 
illustrations. 



CHAPTER XV 

SOCIAL SERVICE AND WELFARE WORK 

Social service aims, through exercise of the philan- 
thropy interest, to provide for others the opportunity, 
means and incentive to develop their capacities, along the 
lines of the various interests, into capabilities. It aims 
to bring about a normal condition of living, in which each 
of the various interests secures such satisfaction, that all 
will promote a harmonious or well-rounded state of well- 
being. 

The politico-legal interest also aims through co-oper- 
ative effort to establish means and conditions under which 
all can attain to a state of normal living, in which they 
will secure due satisfaction along all the various lines of 
interest. It has been found that efforts along politico- 
legal lines must be supplemented by individual and col- 
lective efforts along philanthropic lines, if others are to 
be enabled to live under even approximately normal con- 
ditions. 

Welfare work must also recognize that men have po- 
litico-legal, philanthropy, family and home, sociability, 
health, education, wealth, beauty, vocation, and recrea- 
tion interests. It must also recognize that man has a 
moral interest which impels him to seek a normal condi- 
tion of living in which he gains satisfaction for all these 
interests in due proportion. The vocational interest is an 

161 



162 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

interest in rendering service to others in exchange for 
the means whereby the one rendering the service can at- 
tain to a normal condition of living. 

Welfare work must see that the employee fits himself 
to render and actually renders service for which he de- 
serves to receive the means whereby he can attain to a 
normal condition of living. Welfare work must also see 
that the employee actually does receive the means of se- 
curing a normal condition of living. It must also fur- 
nish guidance in using the means so that the normal 
condition will be as fully attained as may be. 

Welfare work must provide opportunities to discover 
capacities for service, to develop the capacities into capa- 
bilities, and to exercise the capabilities in rendering ser- 
vice, and to secure adequate compensation and recogni- 
tion for services rendered. It must make advancement 
depend on efficiency and see that it comes as a reward 
for efficiency. It must provide a way of estimating qual- 
ity of service and of adequately rewarding it. An em- 
ployee must not be condemned without a fair hearing and 
an opportunity for appeal. 

Welfare work must provide measures to counteract 
too narrow specialization. How can the narrowly spe- 
cialized tasks, so lacking in change and novelty that they 
are deadening, be made to take on attractiveness? One 
will be content with even routine work, if it brings re- 
turns, allows time, and furnishes opportunity and incen- 
tive to the adequate satisfaction of interests not exercised 
in the tasks. To attain to this, welfare work must pro- 
vide in addition to the wage paid, means for satisfying 



WELFARE WORK 163 

the various interests, other than the vocation, previously 
enumerated, or at least must supplement already exist- 
ing means when they are inadequate or unavailable to 
the employee. The welfare work must see that the length 
of the working day, the amount, and speed, and condi- 
tions of the work conserve the well-being of the worker. 
Only so much energy must be used as can be replaced 
by rest and recreation. 

Through such social service one can secure efficient ef- 
forts from employees through interest in holding the rou- 
tine job as a thing worth while, rather than through fear 
of discipline or loss of the job. Efficient service can be se- 
cured through rendering the service rightly profitable to 
the one who renders it. 

It may be helpful in inspiring a desire to serve, if the 
employee is rightly informed as to the service the busi- 
ness is rendering and of the important part he plays in 
rendering that service. 

Instead of the system of control through fear of dis- 
cipline, business must provide to some extent for control 
through co-operative effort. The employees should have a 
part in managing the things which concern their well- 
being. This can be done through some form of represen- 
tative participation in control. Some responsibility should 
be placed on the employees. They should be given oppor- 
tunities to serve themselves and the business in lines out- 
side their usual vocations, as far as they are prepared 
to do so. 

The efficient business must establish the spirit of team 
work, or the willingness to co-operate among those whose 



164 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

efforts carry it on. This is the spirit of mutual helpful- 
ness. Each desires the other to do his best and assists 
him to do so. Each is willing to profit by the wisdom of 
others. This spirit will grow, or decrease, in accordance 
with the principles of crowd contagion. The important 
thing, in developing it, is to have leaders with the right 
spirit in positions of prestige, so that they will exercise 
suggestive control over others. The example they set 
will thus be imitated. 

We are aiming to give only the general ideal which 
should be aimed at in welfare work. The special lines in 
which efforts will be most productive of good, will vary 
greatly with the business. 



PART III 

FACTORS AND PROCESSES OF INFLUENCING BEHAVIOR. 

CHAPTER XVI 

SUGGESTION 

Suggestion is a term of very broad meaning. It is 
the name of a process, and also of the factor which brings 
about the process. 

Suggestion is the name of the means and of the process 
whereby the hygienic processes are effected, or by which 
a person is caused to experience an emotional state, to 
believe a proposition, or to desire a thing, or to perform 
an act without giving adequately deliberate considera- 
tion to all the grounds, or reasons, or evidence for and 
against, the feeling, or belief, or desire, or act thus ac- 
cepted. 

Suggestion and the response to the suggestion, gen- 
erally known as imitation, are very difficult subjects to 
discuss. The term imitation is as indefinite in its mean- 
ing as the term suggestion. Wherever one begins to dis- 
cuss these subjects, he will soon see that some advantage 
would have been gained by previously discussing some- 
thing else. 

Much of the difficulty and unprofitableness of the dis- 
cussion has come from the use of terms that are too broad, 
general, and indefinite in meaning. Much ambiguity has 

165 



iO— 



166 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

pervaded the subject. The following terminology and 
outline are offered in the hope that they will help to 
avoid ambiguities and to bring intelligible order into this 
confusing maze. 

TYPICAL WAYS IN WHICH BEHAVIOR IS INFLUENCED 

1. Unintentional or intentional suggestive influence 
on hygienic processes. 

2. Suggestion, mainly unintentional, bringing about 
subconscious induction of action, or of emotion and ac- 
tion. 

3. Suggestion, apparently unintentional but often in- 
directly intentional in origin, bringing about spontane- 
ous imitation. 

Type 3 is a manifestation of self-assertion in the one 
imitating. 

Types 4 and 5 manifest self-assertion on the part of 
the one making the appeal or solicitation. They aim to 
arouse a compliance or response in which self-subjection 
is manifested. 

4. Suggestive appeal aiming to secure compliance in 
the form of intentional imitation, but may lead to contra- 
imitation. 

5. Solicitation aiming to secure response involving 
acceptance and rational imitation, but may lead to refusal 
to accept. 

Any type may be re-enforced by one or more of the 
preceding types. 

6. Deliberate presentation aiming to lead to fully rea- 
soned assent and deliberate choice. 



SUGGESTION 167 

SUGGESTIVE INFLUENCE ON PHYSICAL PROCESSES 

The feeling or emotional state aroused by suggestion 
affects the working of the varous organs of the body. 
There is an old story which illustrates this satisfactorily. 
Whether the events ever happened exactly as here re- 
lated does not matter. Every one can confirm in his own 
experience the essential truthfulness of the principle it 
illustrates. 

Several friends of a man decided to make an experi- 
ment in suggestion on him. In the morning the man 
started to his place of business feeling as well as usual. 
Some of the conspirators met him on his way down town. 
Others visited him in his place of business. Each, in 
turn, told him that his complexion was bad, that he was 
getting thin, that he looked sick, or that he appeared to 
have fever, or made some other depressing remark. 

Before night the man felt that he was sick and went 
to consult a physician. The suggestions of his friends 
had aroused emotions which deranged the working of cer- 
tain mental and bodily processes. 

Every one is thus influenced, for better or for worse, 
by the remarks and appearance of those around him. 
How the results are brought about by things which arouse 
feeling or emotion will be made clear by the following 
discussion. 

By supporting the body of the person experimented 
upon on a carefully balanced table, it has been shown 
that the head becomes heavier when mental activity is 
increased, as in reciting the multiplication table. But 



168 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

the feet become heavier, if the person experimented upon 
imagines himself taking leg exercises in the gymnasium. 

It was thus shown that the attention, to some extent, 
indirectly controls the circulation of the blood in vari- 
ous parts of the body. Suggestion may, in a similar way, 
through influencing the attention, increase or decrease 
the blood supply and the nourishment and activity of 
various organs of the body. 

Every feeling or emotion sets up a movement some- 
where in the body. Each emotion has its characteristic 
form of bodily expression. 

The feelings and emotions influence breathing, diges- 
tion, circulation, nutrition, the removal of waste products, 
and other bodily processes. The pleasant feelings have 
a favorable influence and the unpleasant ones an unfav- 
orable influence. 

The following will illustrate a few of the more evident 
physiological effects of emotion. Fear contracts the blood 
vessels of the skin, makes one grow pale, and decreases 
the flow of saliva. Shame dilates the blood vessels, so 
that more blood passes through them. Hence shame 
causes one to blush. Pain may make one cry out or shed 
tears. Anger causes the heart to beat faster and arouses 
violent actions. 

The emotions just mentioned affect the appetite and 
digestion and general bodily well-being unfavorably. The 
opposite emotions have a favorable influence. Among 
them are courage or confidence, self-approbation, love, 
optimism, etc. 

Such physiological changes are not under the direct 



SUGGESTION 169 

control of the will. They must be controlled indirectly 
by controlling the emotion. 

If one gives free play to the expressive bodily acts 
which ordinarily accompany an emotion, he thereby 
strengthens the emotion. The crying increases the sor- 
row. The trembling and the running away make the 
fear greater. 

The snarling lip and the blow increase the rage. The 
bodily acts in which the emotion is expressed react to 
increase the emotion. However, many of these acts can 
be controlled more or less completely. The emotion can 
be lessened by holding them in check. For example, if 
one holds in check the act to which the anger impels, un- 
til he has counted ten, the feeling will be greatly weak- 
ened. 

One can control an undesirable emotion by withdraw- 
ing his attention from the things which cause it and con- 
centrating it on things which tend to arouse feelings 
pleasurable in character and opposed to the undesirable 
emotion. 

One who endeavors earnestly to think, and talk, and 
especially to act, as if the desired emotion were being ex- 
perienced will tend to weaken the emotion he is opposing 
and to arouse the one desired. 

SUGGESTION AS A HEAUNG AGENT 

Just as joy makes the heart beat faster while fear 
slows it up and checks the action of the salivary glands, 
or embarrassment makes one blush, or anger deranges 
the liver and digestion, so suggestion by arousing these 



170 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

and other emotions is able to bring about great physio- 
logical changes. Hence suggestion may be used as a 
healing agent. 

The therapeutic value of suggestion has long been 
known and used by physicians. The suggestion of the 
physician often contributes as much as the remedy to 
bring about the cure. 

Suggestion effects its cure by arousing favorable ideas 
and feelings. It is not necessary for a suggestion to be 
made during the ordinary waking consciousness. It may 
be even more effective, if given during the hypnotic sleep. 
Hypnosis will be discussed briefly later on. 

Some claim that remarkable results have been accom- 
plished by giving suggestions to children and others dur- 
ing ordinary sleep. The explanation offered is that sub- 
conscious physiological or mental processes, or subcon- 
scious processes involving both mind and brain, have been 
set going and have persisted until they have worked out 
their result. 

Many of the physiological processes which must be in- 
fluenced to improve health are regulated by subconscious 
psycho-physical, or mental processes not directly undei 
the control of consciousness. These processes can be 
influenced profoundly during the hypnotic sleep. They 
seem to be somewhat similarly susceptible to influence, 
during ordinary sleep, and during the half waking con- 
dition of vague consciousness immediately preceding or 
following sleep, or even during ordinary waking con- 
sciousness. Some claim that one can accomplish much 
by making suggestions to himself in a drowsy state, or 



SUGGESTION AS A HEALING AGENT 171 

by getting someone else to make them to him in the half 
sleeping state. 

In making therapeutic suggestions to others during 
their ordinary waking consciousness effort should be 
made to keep the result to be accomplished clearly in 
mind. Persistent subconscious activities can be estab- 
lished through persistent conscious activities. Use every 
means to inspire confidence that the end will be gained 
satisfactorily. A state of confident expectant attention 
that a bodily condition will be brought about will help 
much toward bringing it about. 

The successful outcome of a suggestion is more likely 
to be realized if the subject has an unwavering belief in 
its efficacy. The means effective in working the cure are 
the suggestion and the confidence inspired. This principle 
explains the results achieved by the various systems of 
suggestive therapeutics. The emotional state of belief is 
favorable to the cure. It does not seem to make much 
difference whether the belief springs from faith in God, 
or in the skill and knowledge of the physician, or 
in the curative powers of his medicine, or in the relic 
of a saint, or in the totem of a savage, or in the cura- 
tive powers of nature. The belief centers attention on 
the idea that the cure will come. The idea and the favor- 
able emotion held steadily in mind finally effect the cure. 

A physician can use suggestion in preparing a patient 
for an operation. By suggestion he can help to over- 
come resistance to the anaesthetic and can lessen its evil 
effect. The mind of the patient can be put in a proper 
state to stand the nervous shock. 



172 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

To accomplish these results the physician will keep 
prominently in the patient's mind the idea that the oper- 
ation will be entirely successful; that he will come out 
of it much improved in health. He should employ his 
professional knowledge to make the patient feel that he 
has every reason to expect good results. The physician 
can thus build up around the central suggestion that all 
will be well, a constellation of marginal ideas, all tending 
to inspire and justify belief, and all giving support to the 
central suggestion. A hopeful outlook, founded on a 
reasonable basis, gives a hopeful feeling that will con- 
tribute much to a favorable outcome. In this way the 
physician can dispel fear or dread which would be a dis- 
turbing factor, and put in its place a powerful stimulant 
toward restoring the normal condition of health. 

The good physician will regularly supplement his treat- 
ment with suggestions that it will accomplish the desired 
result. If he has established a reputation for doing the 
highest grade of professional work, and has a personality 
which inspires confidence, he will frequently find them of 
more assistance in effecting cures than the medicine he 
gives. 

One would hardly rely on suggestion alone to cure a 
toothache caused by an abscess, though suggestion might 
make one less sensitive to the pain. It might stimulate 
the natural forces of the organism to greater activity in 
overcoming the infection and absorbing the accumulated 
pus. After such a diseased condition is relieved by an 
operation, suggestion may do much to bring about a cure. 

To believe in wrong functioning of any organ is to 



SUGGESTION AS A HEALING AGENT 173 

suggest it and increase it. Attention to a toothache 
caused by an irritated nerve may increase the derange- 
ment causing the pain, and consequently increase the 
pain. A pain is likely to be more severe after one has 
gone to bed, as there is nothing to distract attention from 
it. The attention is focused upon it and increases it. 

Often the mere visit to a dentist's office will cure a 
toothache, before treatment is applied. This is more like- 
ly to happen if one intends to have the tooth pulled. The 
ache is lessened as the attention is withdrawn from it 
and centered on the painful treatment in prospect. The 
assurance of finding relief helps to bring about the cure. 
The emotional state is favorable to the cure taking place. 
The proper functioning of the deranged part is estab- 
lished. 

AUTO-SUGGESTION 

The suggestions one makes to himself are known as 
auto-suggestions. Such suggestions should be clearly 
formulated in words. Thoughts are clear and definite 
only when so expressed. Do not be content with general- 
ities. State concisely the particular thing you wish to 
bring about. Concentrate attention on your suggestion, 
and repeat it frequently with full intention to make it 
effective. Always make the suggestion in the positive 
form. Say "I will do this" or "I will be this." 

A good time to make suggestions to one's self is after 
retiring. Then other mental processes will not prevent 
the processes of brain and mind aroused by the sugges- 
tion from persisting and registering themselves. 



174 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

If one wishes to improve his health by suggestion he 
should avoid attending to symptoms of derangement. He 
should discover unhealthful habits and replace them with 
healthful habits. He should not be contented with say- 
ing "I am getting better" or "This organ of mine is go- 
ing to work all right," or "I am feeling fine." He should 
act confidently as if it were so and develop a spirit of 
hopefulness. 

One who is looking for little aches or pains or symp- 
toms of disorder can usually find them. Attention di- 
rected to them only increases the disorder and the pain. 
The patent medicine advertisement often presents as the 
symptoms of serious disease slight derangements such 
as every one has. By directing attention to them it in- 
creases the derangement. It puts one in a state of mind 
which makes him ready to accept the suggestion to buy 
the particular medicine advertised. See the "Psychology 
of Advertising." 

One who ignores his mental and bodily ills makes them 
smaller and lessens their power for evil. Talk and act 
in a hopeful way. In thought at least, whistle or sing a 
cheerful tune. Center attention on optimistic thoughts 
and the little blue devils of pessimism will slink out of 
mind, with a sense of shame at their insignificance and 
impotence. 

A man who retires completely from business is more 
likely to break down in health than is one who contin- 
ues to perform business activities that are well within 
his powers. When business affairs no longer occupy the 
mind of a man who has led an active life, he will be in- 



AUTO-SUGGESTION 175 

clined to attend to and exaggerate the symptoms of phy- 
sical disorder which would receive scant attention, if 
his mind were engaged in business matters. Attention 
so directed to symptoms of disorder increases the dis- 
order. 

The capability of performing business activities must 
be exercised, or the power will atrophy from disuse. The 
man who resigns himself to a life of uselessness will 
tend very rapidly to become useless. 



CHAPTER XVII 

SUBCONSCIOUS INDUCTION 

Subconscious induction is brought about through the 
awakening by appropriate stimuli of various instinctive 
tendencies or predispositions to action. Even when one 
is only vaguely aware that another is expressing an emo- 
tion or performing an action, he is predisposed to ex- 
perience a similar emotion or perform a similar act. 

See the previous discussion of "Ideo-Motor x\ctivity," 
"Interest in the Behavior of Others" and ''Imitation." 

In subconscious induction, the stimulus arouses an 
impulse, or a feeling and impulse, of which one is only 
dimly conscious, as his attention is focused elsewhere. 
If the impulse, or feeling and impulse, aroused become 
focal elements in consciousness, they lead to spontaneous 
imitation, to be discussed later. 

Frequently the subconscious imitative activity appears 
only after the stimulus has been active several times. 
The repeated activity seems to have a cumulative effect. 

In subconscious induction the suggestion produces its 
imitative response through the impression it makes on 
the marginal consciousness, while the focal consciousness 
which is a large factor in controlling action is occupied 
with other things. This form of suggestion arouses im- 
pulses and activities which seem to be self-originated. 
In determining the response they co-operate with the de- 

176 



SUBCONSCIOUS INDUCTION 177 

sires and purposes which spring from the conscious de- 
liberative processes. 

Through subconscious induction one may absorb the 
ideas and feelings and copy the acts of others when he 
has no intention or purpose of doing so, or even con- 
trary to his express purpose to refrain from doing so. A 
Northerner living in the South may thus unconsciously 
catch the Southern drawl or the Southern attitude to- 
ward the negroes. 

One may cough, or sneeze, or laugh, or yawn merely 
because someone else does so in his presence, or suggests 
it by something he says. A child who associates with a 
stammerer will tend to acquire the habit of stammering. 
One becomes infected with the latest slang or popular 
song. One takes on the ideas, feelings, actions, man- 
ners, and emotional attitudes of his associates, without 
any conscious purpose of copying a pattern. Social con- 
ventions, customs, and traditions thus come to be ab- 
sorbed. 

It is largely through the unintentional imitation of 
subconscious induction that the effects of crowd con- 
tagion are brought about. Political parties make prac- 
tical use of it to create favorable sentiment during a cam- 
paign. In a political demonstration the torches, the red 
lights, the lively music, the transparencies and the cheer- 
ing stimulate both the marchers and the onlookers. The 
onlookers, rendered uncritical by the large numbers and 
the emotions aroused, get the impression that everyone 
is "for it." The imposing demonstration gives prestige 



178 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

to the party. The loyalty of the wavering is strength- 
ened. Many will unconsciously follow the crowd. 

Instinctive interest in the behavior of others is main- 
ly interest in the feelings and volitional attitudes and ac- 
tions manifested in their behavior. The suggestive in- 
fluence of the expressions of feelings and volitional atti- 
tudes is stronger than the suggestive influence of the 
expression of the ideas from which they spring. 

One likes to flatter himself that what he thinks, feels, 
or does, is originated independently by himself. The 
suggestions of volition and feeling come so subtly as 
not to disturb one's illusions on that point. Opinions 
are more likely to meet with critical examination before 
acceptance or rejection. One is inclined to be very in- 
tolerant of what does not fit in with his preconceived 
opinions. 

Hope and fear spread rapidly through a community 
by contagion. People are more suggestible to fear than 
to hope, as is shown, by the fact that the depression of 
a panic is likely to be more acute than the inflation of a 
boom. 

The interest in behavior, and the tendency to imitate 
it, co-operates with other instinctive tendencies in bring- 
ing about conformity to the social will. In so doing, it 
performs a very important function. However, the imi- 
tative tendency may carry men to a harmful extreme. 

The fear and the excited action of a few people, when 
the cry of fire is heard, may arouse a frenzied panic of 
fear throughout a large audience and cause a most un- 
reasonable and disastrous stampede. The suggestions 



SUBCONSCIOUS INDUCTION 179 

of a violent agitator in a crowd assembled out of mere 
curiosity to hear what he has to say, may kindle a great 
conflagration of blind rage. At first only a few are af- 
fected by his frantic appeals, but each so moved becomes 
in turn a center of contagion. Each helps increase the 
excitement of the others, and each is assailed by sugges- 
tions coming from so many individuals that those who 
assembled as a curious crowd become an unthinking sav- 
age mob. 

One's feeling of individual responsibility is lessened in 
a crowd. He does not critically examine the ideas put 
forth. The consciousness that each member of the crowd 
has the same idea, and to some extent the same feeling, 
as is evidenced by their actions and expressions, greatly 
multiplies the force of the suggestion and makes one 
less inclined to resist it. 

The psychology of imitation explains the bond which 
unites men into a cohesive, co-operating social unity. The 
insane can not thus co-operate. The normal imitative 
impulses are lacking in them. They do not respond to 
suggestive influences. One attendant can control a whole 
roomful of the insane, because he never has to fear con- 
certed action on their part. 

It is a sign of mental and social soundness to enter 
enthusiastically into such movements as appeal to the 
best judgment of the wisest. Only a small minority have 
the genius to do really original or constructive thinking 
or to improve the prevalent ways of doing things. The 
aim of the less gifted minority should be, not to blindly 



180 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

imitate the innovaters, but to give them a fair chance to 
make good. 

The forms of religion, government and law, the so- 
cial conventions and other sorts of conventionality and 
organization are accepted largely through subconscious 
imitation and the spontaneous imitation next to be dis- 
cussed. They become firmly fixed by habit, and are 
changed with difficulty. The habitual becomes agreeable 
and easy. Getting out of the old rut requires unpleas- 
ant effort. 

Such habits as the above must be recognized as clear 
hindrances to progress, before the effort necessary to 
change them will be made. The forms of religion, gov- 
ernment, and law tend to become archaic. The spirit 
which prompted them will change much more readily 
than these external matters. The same principles apply 
to business organization and methods. It is necessary 
to resort to solicitation or deliberate presentation to bring 
about changes in such things. 

SPONTANEOUS IMITATION 

The imitation resulting from suggestion is not always 
unintentional in character. One may set about it con- 
sciously to copy some pattern which arouses interest. 
This is called intentional imitation. One may thus set 
about it to adopt the manner and methods of someone 
who is unusually expert, or has prestige of some other 
sort. One may profit greatly in thus imitating others, 
though he should study and test what he is imitating. 



SPONTANEOUS IMITATION 181 

He should not endeavor to adopt it blindly, but rather 
to adapt it to his personality and ability. 

This kind of intentional imitation is a manifestation 
of self-assertion on the part of the one doing the imi- 
tating. This distinguishes it from the response to an 
appeal or solicitation, which involves self -subjection to 
the will of another. 

The one who makes the suggestions which bring about 
this kind of unintentional imitation, does so unintention- 
ally. That is, he does not endeavor to bring about com- 
pliance with his will. Or, if he aims to do so, the one 
doing the imitating is unaware of the fact. 

For example, the one imitating a fashion generally 
believes the act is one of self-assertion. He is unaware 
that the act is one of self-subjection or compliance with 
the will of those who have originated and prescribed the 
fashion, as a means of securing profit for themselves. 

Unintentional imitation is brought about through sug- 
gestions which exert their influence on the marginal ele- 
ments of consciousness. The suggestions which cause 
intentional imitation occupy a focal position in conscious- 
ness. Attention is centered on them. 

Intentional imitation is unreasoned, but not necessarily 
unreasonable. The acts to which it leads are generally 
reasonable. They do not spring from deliberative pro- 
cesses, but they can usually be justified by a process of 
reasoning. 

Spontaneous imitation comes under the head of ideo- 
motor activity. The suggestion is made without sup- 
porting reason. Some instinct, or interest, or desire is 



182 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

aroused by suggestion. The impulse to action accom- 
panying it, is in the focus of consciousness, and tends to 
pass over into the appropriate act. If it secures and 
holds the attention so that inhibiting ideas are prevented 
from occurring, it will be carried out into action. 

There is no sharp dividing line between the uninten- 
tional imitation previously discussed and the spontane- 
ous imitation now under consideration. It is difficult, at 
times, to say whether the suggestion is working in dim 
consciousness or in clear consciousness, or whether the 
imitation is intentional or unintentional. In a similar 
way, intentional imitation merges gradually into rational 
imitation, to be considered later. 

In the example previously given, of crowd contagion 
during a political demonstration, may be found many in- 
fluences bordering on or merging into intentional imi- 
tation. If men holding important social, professional, 
or business positions are seen in the procession, their pres- 
tige may influence many to accept suggestions which oc- 
cupy the focus of consciousness. We tend strongly to 
feel as we are conscious that those around us are feel- 
ing, just as the feelings of those around us tend to in- 
fluence our feelings by affecting our subconsciousness. 

We tend to imitate the acts of others that are in the 
focus of our consciousness. One who closely watches 
the behavior of another will tend to perform similar acts. 
One person on the street looking up will tend to cause 
many to look up. One who sees a crowd running down 
the street will feel a strong impulse to join them. The 
idea of the act tends to pass over into the performance of 



SPONTANEOUS IMITATION 183 

the act, in accordance with the principle of ideo-motor 
activity. The strength of the stimulus, the inherent at- 
tractiveness of the thing suggested, the frequency of the 
repetition, the absence of distracting stimuli; all are im- 
portant factors in making the suggestion effective. 

Suggestions that assail one from many sources, in suc- 
cession or at the same time, have their potency greatly 
increased. In this way panics and booms are carried far 
beyond what the real conditions warrant. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

FASHION, A TYPE OF INTENTIONAL IMITATION 

The interest in fashion has its origin in instinctive im- 
pulses. It takes its form largely through unreflecting 
response to suggestions coming from many sources. One 
comes to feel that he must be in style, if he is to amount 
to anything. The real interests which the fashion serves, 
or fails to serve, are revealed only by a critical investiga- 
tion such as the genuine devotee of fashion is not dis- 
posed to make. 

Clothes make up a large part of the things with which 
fashion has to do. Fashion disregards many of the in- 
terests clothes should serve. 

Clothes should serve as a means of gaining normal 
satisfaction for the health, wealth, vocation, recreation, 
beauty and sociability interests. 

Clothes should be a satisfactory means of promoting 
health. They should protect from heat, cold, wet, etc. 
They should promote, or at least not interfere with, the 
functioning of various organs of the body. 

Clothes should be adapted to carrying on vocational 
and avocational activities. 

Clothes should meet the recreational demands for 
novelty and diversion, by providing means by which the 
monotony of life is interrupted. 

184 



FASHION 185 

Clothes should be designed to satisfy the interest in 
beauty. 

Clothes should reveal the physical attractions of the 
wearer to his own and to the other sex, while they at 
the same time meet the demands of modesty. They 
should not merely reveal physical attractiveness. They 
should make it more effective. At least, as far as may 
be, clothes should conceal deficiencies or make up for 
lack of physical attractions. 

The culture and refinement and good taste of the 
wearer should also be revealed in his clothes. They 
should be adapted to the individual personality. 

Clothes should satisfy the sociability interest. They 
should give distinction and prestige to the wearer. They 
should furnish means to satisfy the instinct of self-as- 
sertion, the desire for approbation, emulation, rivalry 
and other instincts, in which the sociability interest has 
its roots. 

Clothes should satisfy the various interests they serve 
with due regard to their relative importance. The ex- 
penditure of wealth required to procure clothes should 
not be so great as to involve undue sacrifice of other 
interests not served by clothes. 

The interest in fashion has developed largely from an 
element of minor importance in the general interest in 
gaining superiority through imitating those who have 
attained superiority. The one element has been magni- 
fied in importance, while the importance of the other ele- 
ments has been correspondingly minimized. By under- 
standing this general interest one can see how this re- 



186 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

suit has been brought about, and also perceive the part 
this interest should play in promoting normal well-being. 

Certain men are recognized as having possessed and 
exercised more than ordinary capability for securing sat- 
isfaction along one or more of the various lines of in- 
terest. These men are regarded as superior. They are 
recognized as having prestige. 

The instinct of imitation in co-operation with the gen- 
eral interest in self-realization, manifesting itself along 
the lines of the special interests, makes one predisposed 
to strive to become superior through imitating those who 
have become superior. 

This impulse to imitate superior persons is very com- 
mendable, when its form of development is properly 
guided by educational influences. It then takes the form 
of a conscious endeavor to develop capabilities similar to 
the ones possessed by those who have been more than 
ordinarily successful, and to exercise these capabilities 
according to their example. In striving for this superi- 
ority, one is also aiming to secure the prestige which it 
gives. The aim is to gain superiority and prestige by 
imitating those who have superiority and prestige. The 
aim is not merely to resemble them through imitation, 
but also to distinguish one's self from those who lack 
superiority and prestige, by a process of contra-imitation. 

Men do not merely feel an impulse to imitate the con- 
spicuously successful by developing qualities of char- 
acter and capabilities similar to those which have en- 
abled them to gain their unusual success. There is a 
very strong tendency to counterfeit their superiority by 



FASHION 187 

imitating the superficial external, or merely accidental 
features which distinguish the successful from the unsuc- 
cessful. 

Men who are prominent in any line have a certain spe- 
cious prestige, even when their prominence is not due to 
merit, but has been secured merely by accident. Many 
feel strong impulses to imitate these in the features which 
distinguish them from the less prominent. Clothes fur- 
nish a convenient means for satisfying this impulse. 

Formerly ,people who had manifested conspicuous abil- 
ity to attain success along some important line of inter- 
est had much to do with determining what fashions 
should be in vogue, or even with originating them. Peo- 
ple adopted the fashions set by these in an endeavor to 
gain a prestige similar to theirs. Now the people of 
superior attainments or achievements have little influ- 
ence in determining the trend of fashion. The styles are 
adopted by them, as by others, with eagerness, with in- 
difference, or with reluctance. 

Styles are now orignated by those who are animated 
mainly by commercial motives. They have acquired 
great prestige, because of their past successes in bring- 
ing out new fashions. These successes have been gained 
in catering to a certain class of people, as will be ex- 
plained later. The prestige thus secured has enabled 
them to control the media for disseminating fashions. 

The most able and successful of the designers of fash- 
ion have seen the commercial necessity of co-operating 
with each other. Their combined influence has so far 
proven to be practically irresistible. Certain fashion pa- 



188 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

pers, influential manufacturing concerns and commercial 
houses where the latest styles are exhibited and sold, have 
fallen in line. The daily papers and lesser commercial 
houses have followed suit. The combined prestige of 
the leading designers has enabled them to control the 
media through which style suggestions are made effective. 

The commercial interests follow this leadership for 
obvious reasons. It is a never failing source of easy 
money. It diverts to the one line of business much 
money that would otherwise be spent for different things. 

The various media of publicity give their space gen- 
erally to promulgating fashions. The reasons for this 
are various. The readers are eager to read about such 
matters. They lead to profitable advertising. They put 
forth without serious criticism, what comes as the accred- 
ited style. There are sundry reasons why they refrain 
from criticism. Perhaps they do not see clearly the force 
of the grounds for criticism. They can not freely criti- 
cise what is being boosted in their own columns with 
profitable advertising. By criticism they would lose pres- 
tige with many who would regard them as "behind the 
times" or "out of date" or "old fogy." Sporadic criti- 
cism would be of little avail. 

Since styles now command all the forces of merchan- 
dizing, and all the resources of free and paid publicity, 
they spread rapidly. The knowledge of a new style and 
the suggestion to adopt it will now travel in a few days 
distances that formerly required years. The suggestion 
also comes with a prestige and a force which make it al- 
most irresistible. 



FASHION 189 

The originators of fashion put forth the edict that "styl- 
ish people will wear this, this season." All the various 
media through which style suggestions are made effective, 
pass along the suggestion as coming from one whose 
judgment is above criticism, and whose authority can not 
be resisted safely. 

Those who originate fashion in clothes and dominate 
the media for disseminating fashion, once merely aimed 
to satisfy the desire for novelty, for personal adornment 
and for personal distinction. They have now come to 
exploit these interests. They prescribe a change from 
felt to straw hats in cold weather and from straw to felt 
in hot weather. They aim to make changes in styles as 
frequent, and as extreme as a perverted appetite will 
swallow. They even have a share in perverting the ap- 
petite. They disregard certain other interests clothes 
should serve. How have they acquired the ability to do 
this? 

The leading designers of fashion have gained their 
prestige largely because they have been successful in 
catering to a certain class which is small, but which has 
been very conspicuous in the affairs of fashionable so- 
city. The members of this class have engaged very stren- 
uously in competing for social position. 

The members of this class belong to an aristocracy 
which is based on wealth, rather than on birth or per- 
sonal achievement. In this aristocracy of wealth, social 
standing is based very largely on the exclusiveness of 
the styles adopted, on the frequency with which they are 
changed, and on the high prices paid. Distinction is 



190 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

based on complete and conspicuous conformity to the ac- 
credited fashion, rather than on ability manifested in 
originating new styles, or taste in adapting prevalent 
fashion to personal requirements. 

The mere possession of means to spend gives one a 
potential power that makes him a factor to be reckoned 
with. The fact that a man is a millionaire greatly in- 
creases his ability to make others conform to his will. In 
making his ideas prevail, even if he does not spend his 
money to do so, he is many times as effective as a poor 
man of much greater wisdom and worth of character. 
The mere possession of wealth puts one in a position to 
exert great influence. People instinctively subject them- 
selves to this influence. Hence when men of inferior 
wisdom and personal worth possess great wealth, they are 
a menace to society. They tend to fashion the members 
of society after the pattern of themselves. For example, 
they exert a pernicious influence in imposing on less 
wealthy members of society their extravagant habits of 
spending, and the exaggerated importance they accord to 
conformity to fashion as an index of social standing. 

Personality and other factors, no doubt, play a part in 
gaining social distinction even in this class. While that 
fact is obvious to the members, it is not apparent to the 
onlooker who acquires his conception of them through 
the columns of the magazine and newspaper. 

The doings of this aristocracy of wealth have filled 
a very prominent place in the papers. The external and 
superficial features of their life have been spectacular. 
They have been featured accordingly. Through this pub- 



FASHION 191 

licity the press has tended to establish a general custom 
of estimating social standing by the superficial and false 
criterion attributed to this class. 

The designers of fashions for this class have acquired 
the prestige of the class. They have taken advantage of 
their opportunities. They have encouraged in every way 
the worship of the false gods the people have set up. 

To many, publicity while they are living is much more 
to be desired than undying posthumous fame. It is very 
satisfying to them to rival or excel others even super- 
ficially. By thus "showing off" they attract a very grati- 
fying attention to themselves. They feel they are really 
important because they are conspicuous. 

The fashion designers and promulgators have all 
worked together to confirm such people in their attitude. 
They have fostered the acceptance of an external, arbitrary 
standard of willingness to spend for stylish things as the 
criterion of social standing. They have overstimulated 
the desire for the prominence which comes from the 
prompt conformity to the dictates of fashion's arbiters. 
They have exaggerated the social prestige secured by 
those who are conspicuous for this conformity. Besides 
it is the only way to social distinction open to some, and 
the easiest way for many, so they are not loth to accept 
the suggestion. 

The newspapers have given great publicty to those 
who are racing for position in fashionable society. Many 
people believe that such people have a real importance 
in proportion to their prominence. People overlook the 
fact that in most cases the liberal spenders could not have 



192 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

acquired the wealth they squander. They feel that evi- 
dence, or show, of possessing means to spend will be 
taken as an evidence of personal achievement in securing 
wealth. It is generally believed that willingness to spend 
for stylish things, even at a great sacrifice, will be taken 
as an indication of possessing the means to spend, and of 
a personal worth which earned the wealth. 

Taking the lead in fashion has come to be an easy 
means of gaining social prestige. Being up to date in 
fashion tends to indicate up-to-dateness in lines of real 
progress. 

All these factors have tended to reduce society to a 
demoralizing bondage to fashion. The exaggerated no- 
tion of the importance of fashion leads to an unwar- 
ranted expenditure to adopt the frequent and extreme 
changes. The pursuit of fashion in the extreme form in- 
volves much waste of time, money and energy. It often 
imperils health. Fashions have been designed to meet 
the requirements of the wealthy social racer. They have 
not been adapted to satisfy the normal needs of men. 

If clothes are to promote normal well-being there 
should be some change in styles. These changes should 
afford relief from monotony and promote personal dis- 
tinction. There is a legitimate interest in using clothes 
for these purposes. However,, changes made for these 
purposes should have regard for other interests in clothes, 
and for other interests not concerned with clothes. Have 
they fulfilled these requirements? 

Changes in fashion disregard the convenience of the 
wearer. One laughs at a man trying to walk with his 



FASHION 193 

feet tied together, or inserted in a sack. A skirt so tight 
at the feet as to impede one in walking would be regarded 
as a joke, if people were not blinded by the prestige with 
which the style comes. 

Changes in fashion disregard health. Considerations 
of health have nothing to do with changes from tight to 
loose, or vice versa. With sublime indifference style will 
prescribe high collars and furs for summer, and for win- 
ter, clothes which furnish inadequate protection against 
cold. 

Fashion does not provide means for meeting the re- 
quirements of the individual personality of the wearer. 

Such styles can not be justified by aesthetic consider- 
ations. A thing is not beautiful, unless it serves satis- 
factorily the end it should serve. 

The so-called beauty of fashion is often largely spuri- 
ous. The attractiveness of novelty and the glamor 
thrown over the style by the prestige it promises to con- 
fer are mistaken for beauty. The fashionable esteemed 
as beautiful at any time may soon become unfashionable 
ugliness. 

Fashion is necessarily transitory. It is taken up 
through imitation to secure novelty and distinction. Fash- 
ion arises as a revolt against uniformity. Through imi- 
tation it tends to bring about a return to the uniformity 
against which it revolted. Fashion demands that inno- 
vation must follow upon innovation. 

The frequency with which fashions change has been 
increasing rapidly. Several forces are responsible for 
this. One factor is the false social standards of the aris- 



194 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

trocracy of the rich, and the publicity given to them, as 
explained before. 

The increasing facilities for promptly placing cheap 
imitations on the market have accelerated the rate of 
change. Wearing quality has been disregarded in fash- 
ion. People have been encouraged to buy flimsy and per- 
ishable things merely to get a showy style, because experi- 
ence has shown that even if better materials were used, 
it wouldn't pay. The thing will go out of style before 
it can be worn out. 

Such cheap things are promptly imitated at a cheap 
price. The prompt appearance of the cheap imitation 
detracts from the novelty of the original, and from its 
power to give distinction. The style that has been imi- 
tated with a cheap substitute is discarded and a new one 
adopted. 

The style which is just coming into vogue will sell at a 
high price and bring a gratifying profit. Business men 
are quick to see this and anxious to secure the profit. 
Just as it stimulates the followers to imitate promptly, so 
it spurs on the leaders to bring out new styles as rapidly 
as they can. 

The fashion is not supplied merely to meet a pre-exist- 
ing demand. The originators of fashion aim to make 
the demand for novelty, or change, come sooner than it 
otherwise would. They aim to bring about the accept- 
ance of a much greater change than would be required 
by the naturally developing demand. They send out 
"feelers" to test how soon people can be led to change, 



FASHION 195 

and how far they can be induced to go in making the 
change. 

The originators of fashion aim to make the change so 
soon and so noticable that people who would be well satis- 
fied with things which are still quite presentable, are 
forced to discard them and to buy new ones, to avoid ap- 
pearing conspicuously out of style. 

The purveyors of style know about how much forcing 
and distorting the normal demand will stand, and they 
play the limit. Under the stress of demands created by 
the war they have inaugurated the practice of gener- 
ously "offering" a second style in the middle of the three 
month's season. 

Desire for novelty and for personal distinction are both 
legitimate. Desire to resemble those of superior stand- 
ing in that in which they are felt to be superior should 
be encouraged, if the criterion of standing is a proper 
one. It is not the catering to these desires, but the effort 
to exploit them, and the disregard for other interests, 
that is reprehensible. 

The ideal of fashion should be novelty, with progress 
in contributing to health, comfort, economic, aesthetic, 
and sociability interests. That which is offered to sat- 
isfy the desire for novelty and distinction should never 
involve a sacrifice of health, comfort, or beauty, or de- 
mand undue expenditure of wealth. 

How can people be influenced to accept a truer ideal 
of fashion and to strive to make it real? Reliance must 
be placed on education, in the broad sense of the term, 
to show the speciousness of the false standard of social 



196 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

rank, which is now prevalent. It can also make clear 
the inherent worth and importance of the true standard. 
Education should aim to counteract the tendency to give 
social recognition to the external and relatively unimpor- 
tant symbols of fashion. Social standing should be based 
on estimable qualities of personality and worthy achieve- 
ment. 

The number of people who are enlightened as to the 
real motives back of changes in fashion is rapidly increas- 
ing. These people conform to the new fashion as slow- 
ly as they can. They go no farther in conformity than 
they feel obliged to in order not to appear conspicuous 
for non-conformity. In their desire for unconspicuous 
conformity they make a compromise between their de- 
sire for health, economy, comfort and beauty, and the ar- 
bitrary and extreme changes imposed by fashion. The 
increasing number of these people may, in time, check 
the too frequent and unreasonable changes of fashion. 
Through their influence fashion may at least become less 
tyrannous, extravagant, and irrational, and more regard- 
ful of utility and beauty. 



CHAPTER XIX 

FADS 

Fashions are originated by commercial agencies. They 
gain their vogue through being adopted in a pseudo aris- 
tocracy founded primarily on wealth. In this class, up- 
to-dateness in style of clothes has been conventionalized 
as an index of social standing. Such up-to-dateness pre- 
scribes frequent changes in styles and lavish expenditures 
for them. The prestige of this set and of the designers 
tends, through certain agencies, to impose this conven- 
tion on all members of society. 

The members of the fashionable aristocracy do not 
originate the styles they adopt. If some of the members 
were to adopt styles originated by another member, their 
action would concede, to the one imitated, the prestige 
or leadership for which they are striving in rivalry. 

The styles adopted are originated by certain commer- 
cial factors. Even the leaders in fashionable society have 
but little to do with determining the trend of fashion, 
by rejecting the offerings they do not approve of. 

The originating of fashions has fallen into the hands 
of specialists. These specialists have gained prestige 
through past success in prescribing fashions. There is a 
certain amount of understanding or co-operation among 
them. Manufacturers, retailers, fashion papers, and the 
rest of the press, all submit themselves to the prestige ac- 

197 



198 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

quired by the originators of the fashions, and by the mem- 
bers of the fashionable society for whom the styles are 
originated, and by whom they are adopted. 

The prestige of the designers and of the "fashionable" 
set who adopt their designs, the efforts of commercial 
factors, all well organized and working together, exert 
an almost irresistible influence toward securing con- 
formity to the styles put forth as the accredited fashion. 
Through these co-operating agencies the designers exert 
great influence in saying when an old fashion is to be 
dropped and a new one to be taken up. 

Fads are certain matters of fashion which have not 
been given such conventionalized value, and brought 
under such control. Fads appeal to the desire for nov- 
elty, and furnish satisfaction to some interest. The adop- 
tion or rejection of a fad has not been taken as an in- 
dex of social standing, or of human worth. Hence fads 
can not be systematically and persistently exploited, as 
fashions have been. 

The question of adopting a fad is not one of conform- 
ing to an externally imposed standard. In taking up 
with a fad, one has to consult only the interests con- 
cerned. One who does not follow a fashion is regarded 
as peculiar or eccentric. In the case of a fad, the pecu- 
liar one is the one who adopts it. When the novelty is 
worn off, so that the one who adopts it is no longer re- 
garded as peculiar, the fad interest has begun to ebb. 
Adherence to a fad which has passed out of vogue is not 
regarded as disreputable or "old fogyish," as is the case 
with a fashion which has gone out. One does not lose 



FADS 199 

caste by refusing to take up with a fad, or by refusing 
to drop it. 

In order that a thing may become a fad, it must be 
taken up by those who, because of prestige, are strong 
in suggestive power and can focus the attention of many 
upon it. A thing thus taken up is adopted by many 
through imitation. The fact that many are adopting the 
fad multiplies the suggestive force with which it comes. 

Fads or fashions are not adopted by imitating those 
who are inferior in social standing, or who are not es- 
teemed. Some prominent social leaders of a certain city 
are said to have originated a fashion of wearing becom- 
ing but inexpensive hats. This fashion gave promise of 
having such vogue that it threatened the milliners with 
failure in disposing of the expensive and elaborate crea- 
tions they had in stock. The milliners promptly checked 
the spread of the fashion by giving similar hats to women 
doing cleaning along the streets. The association of the 
hat with women of inferior social rank effectively killed 
the fashion. 

In order to become a fad, a thing must have novelty, 
and must furnish more or less satisfaction to some other 
interest. 

Some fads are taken up mainly for diversion. Taking 
up with the novelty interrupts the monotony of life. It 
also distinguishes one from those who have not adopted 
the fad. If the thing affords no considerable amount of 
satisfaction other than such diversion, interest in it will 
soon wane. One dealing in such a fad should reap a 
large profit to make up for a probable loss in stock which 
will become dead when the interest is lost. 



200 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

A thing which has great and lasting utility may be 
taken up as a fad. The demand for it may become 
greatly inflated, so that it is taken up by many to whom 
the utility is a minor consideration. This may stimulate 
production to an extent that it will be in excess of the nor- 
mal demand which will prevail when the fad interest has 
died. Such was the case with bicycles. 

FADS IN SHOES 

Offering many styles in the shoe trade merely intro- 
duced the state of anarchy found in the realm of fads. 
Subjecting styles in shoes to the whims and whimsies of 
faddists has proved disastrous to stability in the shoe 
business. 

When free competition in orignating styles prevails, 
only a few offerings can be winners, and the great ma- 
jority will be losers. The styles that win will remain in 
vogue only until they are displaced by a new competitor 
for the approval of the fickle and changeable leaders in 
faddism. Winning styles can not be known in advance, 
hence they can not be sold in advance, to any great 
amount. Since they can not be made in advance, they 
must be made in haste, and at great expense. 

Disorganization and uncertainty will continue until 
styles in shoes are brought under a control similar to 
that which prevails in styles in clothes. There must be 
devised some generally respected authority with power to 
say that there shall be but one new fashion at a time. 
This authority must also say what this fashion shall be, 
when it shall be adopted, and when it shall be dropped. 



FADS IN SHOES 201 

When that is attained, fashion, instead of faddism, will 
determine the styles in shoes. 

Fads in shoes originated when certain shoemakers made 
an effort to exploit the fashion interest in shoes. Fashion 
in shoes existed before this movement. The styles were 
controlled in accordance with the principles which govern 
in the realm of fashion in clothes. The style was gener- 
ally accepted as a matter of course by the purchaser. 
Quality and price were the determining factors in buy- 
ing. Shoes were bought when and because they were 
needed. 

The manufacturers back of this movement evidently did 
not understand the difference between the laws govern- 
ing in fads and the laws prevailing in the controlled and 
conventionalized realm of fashion. They evidently 
thought that by merely multiplying styles they could ac- 
complish, in the way of stimulating trade, what is effected 
in fashions in clothes by frequent changes in styles. 

Numerous styles were put forth in an endeavor to stim- 
ulate sales. The desired result was brought about. In 
many instances shoes were bought merely because they 
were novelties, not because they were needed. 

Authoritative control of these styles through co-opera- 
tion was lacking. Conformity to the styles did not have 
conventionalized value. 

In millinery, fad and fashion can co-operate satisfac- 
torily. Both are tempered considerably by freedom to 
modify or adapt the styles to suit the individuality of 
the wearer. 

Such a compromise is practical in millinery but not in 



202 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

shoes. Hats can be made or remodeled to suit the wearer. 
It is no longer practicable to make shoes in small local 
shops, in accordance with the specifications of the wearer. 
Fashion will soon replace fads in shoes. 

INTENTIONAL IMITATION IN TRADITION AND CUSTOM 

Much of our education consists of adopting through 
imitation the habits of thinking feeling and acting of 
those with whom we come in contact directly, or indi- 
rectly through books. The habits of thinking and feel- 
ing so adopted are known as traditions. The habits of 
acting are known as customs. 

Reforms in education, or in social matters, in govern- 
ment, or in business, or in other lines are largely fashions 
set by men who are strong in leadership. The reform 
becomes prevalent as the leaders are imitated. In a re- 
form, the suggestion must usually be supported by reasons 
why, if it is to become effective. It then belongs to the 
class of rational suggestions, to be considered later. 

However, that the intentional, unreasoned imitation 
we have been discussing, plays a large part in such mat- 
ters, is shown by the fact that we may suddenly awaken 
to a realization that we must have vocational guidance, 
some novel form of recreation, prohibition, tariff reform, 
or reform of the courts, or that we must curb the special 
interests, or bring the government back to the people, or 
have military preparedness. 

Panics and booms come in this way, A few strong 
molders of opinion, whose motives are not always above 
suspicion, start the movement by suggesting that we must 






TRADITION AND CUSTOM 203 

curtail business, or that it is slowing up. Others take up 
the suggestion and pass it on. The suggestion that busi- 
ness is going to be bad, coming from many sources, in- 
fluences even the most hopeful business man unfavor- 
ably. There is usually some foundation in actual busi- 
ness conditions for a movement of this sort which reaches 
large proportions, but both panics and boom inflations 
are generally carried by suggestion far beyond the stage 
warranted by economic conditions. 

Waves of increasing and decreasing suggestibility in 
such matters spread throughout the country. The wise 
educator, social or political reformer, will improve the 
opportunity to push through the particular reform which 
at the time is showing greatest potency in arousing imi- 
tative tendencies. He must seize upon this psychological 
moment to make the popular reform effective, whether 
or no it is the one he deems most important. 

We tend to accept as true an assertion that is made to 
us, especially if it is spoken with an air of certainty by 
one whom we regard as an authority. Strong claims 
made by a salesman, or in an advertisement, arouse an 
impulse to accept them as true. We come to believe 
statements that are made to us about an article, if no 
evidence to the contrary occurs to us. No doubt many 
firmly believe that "Morgan and Wright tires are good 
tires" without having a particle of evidence to support 
the statement. If the matter is not of much importance, 
the assertion without a supporting reason may be suffi- 
cient to make the sale. However a suggestion with a 
good supporting reason has stronger impulsive force than 
it would have if unsupported by reason. 



CHAPTER XX 

HYPNOTISM 

Hypnotism is a state of mind induced by suggestion. 
It is a state of greatly increased suggestibility brought 
about by suggestion. 

It has been explained previously that ideas tend to be 
recalled in systems. A central aim or purpose tends to 
determine the line of development which conscious pro- 
cesses and behavior will follow. The aim is to find a 
means of satisfaction for some awakened interest which 
has become the factor controlling the trend of conscious- 
ness and behavior. 

The central controlling interest is the focal element in 
consciousness. From time to time, interests in rivalry 
with the controlling interest are developed in germinal 
form in the margin of consciousness. Such a germinal 
interest may itself become the controlling factor, if it 
appears sufficiently attractive to distract the attention 
from the previously controlling interest and to center it 
upon itself. The more persistently and strongly the at- 
tention is held by a central interest, the less will be the 
attention accorded to a germinal interest, developing in 
the margin of consciousness, and the smaller will be its 
chance of becoming a controlling factor. 

In hypnosis the controlling power of the centrally de- 
veloping interest is greatly increased. It holds the atten- 

204 



HYPNOTISM 205 

tion so completely that marginal ideas leading to antago- 
nistic attitudes of mind and behavior are incapable of 
distracting attention from the central idea, and center- 
ing it on themselves sufficiently to inhibit the central 
train of thought and its appropriate expression. 

In a hypnotized person the centrally developing inter- 
est, which controls the trend of thought and behavior, is 
the one suggested by the operator. It comes as an ex- 
pression of the will of the operator. As such it is un- 
questionably accepted and undeviatingly followed. It is 
thus accepted and followed because it is re-enforced by 
the impulse of self-subjection to the will of the operator. 
In developing the state of hypnosis the impulse of self- 
subjection to the will of the operator has been abnormal- 
ly strengthened until it controls the thought and behavior 
of the subject. 

In the condition of hypnotism the range of conscious- 
ness is narrowed, for the following reason. Yielding 
to the impluse of self-subjection to the will of another 
automatically cuts away from other factors of influence. 
It closes all other channels through which control of con- 
sciousness and behavior can be influenced. When the im- 
pulse of self -subjection to the will of the operator is made 
abnormally active and persistent, the mind to the same 
extent, is abnormally and persistently closed to all other 
influences. 

In hypnotism, the central controlling element in con- 
sciousness is a complex impulse, of which the two ele- 
ments are, the suggestion made by the operator, and the 
strengthened and persistent impulse of self -subjection to 



206 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

his will. The strengthening of the impulse of self-sub- 
jection accounts for its peculiar persistence, as the im- 
pulse to subject one's self to the will of another, is also 
an impulse to cut away from or completely ignore all dis- 
tracting influences. 

The peculiar persistent ascendancy of the impulse of 
self-subjection is brought about in this way. The sub- 
ject is induced to submit himself without resistance to 
the will of the operator. The first step toward strength- 
ening the impulse to self -subjection is to direct the atten- 
tion of the subject to something not in itself interesting 
and which does not tend to arouse an impulse that will 
enter into rivalry with the impulse to self-subjection. A 
monotonous state of mind is developed. 

It is customary to develop this monotonous state of 
mind by fixing the attention of the subject on the idea of 
going to sleep. From this fact has arisen the probably 
fallacious attempt to explain the hypnotic state by say- 
ing that part of the mind or brain has gone to sleep while 
the rest is kept awake and controlled by the operator. 

The object in suggesting sleep is merely to bring about 
a monotonous state of mind, in which the impulse of 
self -subjection can be kept continuously active and 
strengthened by appropriate stimuli. 

The operator accomplishes this by making such re- 
marks as "You will hear what I say but you will go 
sound asleep. You will go sound asleep. You can't open 
your eyes. You will go sound asleep, but you will do so 
and so," etc. In this way he strengthens the impulse of 



HYPNOTISM 207 

self-subjection by exercise, while he avoids arousing im- 
pulses in rivalry with it. 

The instinct of self-subjection is awakened along the 
one specific line, only, of fully accepting and freely fol- 
lowing suggestions made by the operator. This specific 
impulse is stimulated so exclusively and strongly that it 
becomes the dominant factor in controlling thought and 
behavior. 

A peculiar relation known as "rapport" exists between 
the operator and subject. The operator alone can con- 
trol the subject. This peculiar relation is established as 
follows: The impulse of self-subjection is not merely 
compliance with the will of another. It is a decisive re- 
fusal to even consider impulses not in harmony with that 
will. It is, so to speak, the closing of the mind's eye to 
every alternative line of thought, belief, desire, and ac- 
tion, other than the one imposed by the will of the person 
arousing the impulse of self-subjection. 

The suggestibility manifested in hypnotism in an ab- 
normal and exaggerated form is present to a lesser extent 
in the normal life of every one. In the normal state be- 
havior results from the interplay of many motives, the 
impulse of self-subjection being merely one among many 
rivals for supremacy. When it controls behavior its as- 
cendancy is of short duration. In bringing about the 
state of hypnotism, the ascendancy of the impulse is made 
more complete and more persistent than in the normal 
state. 

In hypnotism the suggestive control is exerted solely 
through the instinct of self -subjection, which has been 



208 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

stimulated until its strength and persistency have been 
increased greatly. 

In the appeal to be discussed next, the aim also is to 
arouse an impulse of self -subjection. In the normal state 
this impulse is competing with others for supremacy. 
When the appeal is successful and the impulse gains tem- 
porary ascendancy it usually does so because it is co- 
operating with, or is re-enforced by, some other impulse. 
The re-enforcing element may be the sociability interest 
or some other awakened interest. 

In the appeal the aim is to arouse a complex impulse, 
of which the impulse of self-subjection is one element. 
To make the appeal successful attention must be con- 
centrated on this complex impulse so completely that in- 
hibiting alternatives are cut loose from. 

The solicitation likewise aims to arouse a similar com- 
plex impulse. It also aims to arouse and strengthen 
factors which will re-enforce this impulse, as will be ex- 
plained later. 



CHAPTER XXI 

APPEAL AND SOLICITATION 

An appeal is a suggestion which aims to induce the 
one to whom it is made to comply with the will of the 
one who makes it. It is a manifestation of the instinct 
of self-assertion which endeavors to arouse the instinct 
of self-subjection. It leads to intentional imitation. 

The solicitation aims to accomplish the same end as 
the appeal. In the solicitation, reasoning, or an appeal 
to authority, or both, are employed as a means of making 
the appeal effective. It leads to rational imitation. 

The appeal and the solicitation are discussed more fully 
in the "Psychology of Salesmanship" and the "Psychol- 
ogy of Advertising." 

The emotions of the one making the appeal or solici- 
tation tend, by sympathetic induction, to arouse similar 
emotions in the one to whom it is directed. The one to 
whom the appeal or solicitation, is made, experiences an 
impulse to imitate the behavior of the one making it, 
especially if the one making it is regarded as having pres- 
tige. This principle is made use of in advertisements in 
which the picture represents the appeal as coming from 
one who has prestige. 

Imitation of behavior and sympathetic induction of 
emotion, which are subconscious processes, and inten- 
tional imitation, are factors which add effectiveness to 

209 



210 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

the appeal or solicitation. What has been said about sub- 
conscious induction of action, and feeling and about 
spontaneous imitation, should be borne in mind. 

MAKING AN APPEAL EFFECTIVE 

The appeal aims through suggestion to secure compli- 
ance with the will of the one making it. Compliance 
may be brought about either by awakening an impulse 
of self-subjection, or by stimulating an interest in do- 
ing the thing, or by both. 

The manifestation of positive qualities of personality, 
or of prestige or authority, re-enforces the suggestion 
employed to arouse the impulse of self -subjection. The 
effectiveness of the suggestion also depends on the form 
in which it is made, and on the manner of making it. 

The appeal has many varieties as the following list will 
show. One is attempting to arouse the impulse of self- 
subjection when he commands, requires, insists, dictates, 
reprimands, dominates, directs, etc. Only one who has 
authority or prestige can rely on such appeals. When 
coming from one not possessing authority or prestige they 
tend to arouse an impulse of self-assertion. 

The following denote less direct and more diplomatic 
methods of endeavoring to bring about compliance: in- 
vite, request, advise, suggest, desire, propose, prefer, pre- 
scribe, enjoin, etc. 

Suggestions should be made in the positive form. Say 
"Do this," instead of "Do not do that." The word "not" 
does not carry an inhibiting motor impulse into conscious- 
ness with it. The idea of an act not to be done arouses 



MAKING AN APPEAL EFFECTIVE 211 

just as much interest, and carries with it just as strong 
a motor impulse, as if it were suggested as an act to be 
done. The negative suggestion merely gives force to the 
thing not to be done, by centering attention on it. One 
should be careful to make a positive suggestion of the 
thing to be done, and to center attention on it. 

The form in which a suggestion is made has much to 
do in determining whether a favorable response will be 
secured. A question framed so as to suggest that the 
answer "yes" or "no" is expected, tends strongly to bring 
the suggested answer. This will be made clear by the 
following: "Will you do this?" You will not do this, 
will you?" "You will do this, will you not?" "How do 
you like the maroon color?" Has much more suggestive 
force than "What color do you like?" 

The suggestive appeal to the impulse of self-subjec- 
tion may re-enforce or be re-enforced by the impulse 
aroused by the interest in doing the suggested thing. In- 
terest in doing the suggested thing is aroused by awak- 
ening a foretaste of the satisfaction which will come from 
doing it. This foretaste can be aroused by presenting 
the factors which will give the satisfaction. There is no 
sharp dividing line between the appeal which does this, 
and the solicitation. 

We have been discussing an appeal made by one per- 
son directly to another person. This may be called a 
personal appeal. In such an appeal the positive elements 
of the personality and the prestige of the one making 
the appeal do much toward bringing about the desired 
response. 



212 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

An appeal may be made indirectly to a person by em- 
ploying various means. Such an appeal may be called 
impersonal. It lacks the effective re-enforcing elements 
which come from the personality. 

The advertisement, the window and counter display, 
etc., furnish examples of the impersonal appeal. It de- 
pends mainly on presenting desirable qualities in an at- 
tractive way. It may be re-enforced in the advertisement 
by the "direct command" which is intended to arouse the 
impulse of self-subjection. See the "Psychology of Ad- 
vertising." 



CHAPTER XXII 

SUGGESTIBILITY AND THE ABILITY TO SUGGEST 

The acceptance of a suggestion is known technically as 
imitation. Suggestion and imitation are two aspects of 
the same process. The form which the response to the 
suggestion will take is determined partly by the sugges- 
tion, and partly by the instincts, interests, and various 
other habits of thinking, feeling and acting, of the per- 
son to whom the suggestion is made. The qualities of 
the suggestion and the qualities of character of the per- 
son to whom the suggestion is made, both work together 
to determine the form of the response. The qualities of 
character have already been discussed in treating of the 
instincts, interests, and various other processes of think- 
ing, feeling, and acting. They determine the sort of stim- 
ulus which must be selected to bring about a desired re- 
sult. 

The ordinary psychological treatise considers sugges- 
tion and imitation merely as processes. The man of 
practical affairs must understand the processes in order 
to use suggestion intelligently. He is interested quite as 
much in knowing the character of the factors, or forces, 
or stimuli, which serve as causes to bring about the imi- 
tation, and in understanding how to adapt these stimuli 
to the qualities in the mind which determine the form 
of the action to which the suggestion will lead. 

213 



214 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

In studying suggestion, attention is directed to the 
character of the factors or stimuli which fits them to 
bring about the result aimed at, and also to the processes 
in accordance with which the stimuli must work in bring- 
ing about the result. In studying imitation, attention is 
directed to the qualities and traits of character which de- 
termine the sort of action which results from the sugges- 
tion, and also to the processes involved in the response. 

In order to bring about a response to a suggestion one 
must first discover what instincts, or interests, or other 
habits of thinking, feeling, and acting will bring about 
the desired response, if they are stimulated to activity. 
The problem then is to find the stimulus which has the 
qualities which fit it to appeal to these instincts or in- 
terests and to arouse the desired activity. 

The following general principle will be helpful in deter- 
mining the form of suggestion to be employed to bring 
about a desired response. A suggestion is adapted to 
bring about an act, if it offers some means of satisfying 
an instinct or interest which will lead to the performance 
of the act. A suggestion is fitted to bring about a de- 
sired response, when it appeals to an instinct, or interest, 
or other predisposition to think, feel, and act, which will 
lead to the desired response. 

It must be borne in mind that the term imitation is 
used in the technical sense. In this sense, imitative re- 
sponses include all responses made without previously giv- 
ing adequately deliberate consideration to the reasons for 
and against them. Imitation includes all acts performed 
as the result of an appeal or solicitation. One might be 



Suggestibility and Ability to Suggest 215 

said to be "suggestioned" into performing imitative acts, 
if our language permitted. Such acts as result from fully 
reasoned choice, or demonstrated truth, are not imitative. 

The imitation, or response which follows suggestion, 
is usually not an exact copy, or replica, of the mental 
state or action imitated. Generally the response to the 
suggestion is modified to some extent by the native or 
acquired predispositions of the one "suggestioned." Some 
element of self-expression usually appears in the imi- 
tation. 

When the idea of doing a thing to which one is predis- 
posed by instinct, or interest, or habit, gets into the mind 
and arouses an impulse to do the thing, the actual doing 
of the thing tends to follow as a matter of course, un- 
less the act is prevented, or as it is technically described, 
is inhibited, by some opposing impulse. 

A suggestion which appeals to a strong interest, such 
as that in health, wealth, or education, has great power 
to attract attention, and thus to influence action. How a 
strong interest heightens suggestibility is evidenced by 
the readiness with which an invalid may be induced to 
try all sorts of proposed remedies. 

If one is offered something to eat between meals, when 
he is hungry, he experiences an impulse to accept it. 
However, if it occurs to him that eating the proffered 
food will spoil a good dinner coming later, or will cause 
indigestion, the idea of the undesirable consequences of 
the act will hold in check or inhibit the strong impulse to 
eat. 

The awareness of a situation which concerns the satis- 



216 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

faction of developed instincts, favorably or unfavorably, 
tends to bring about behavior adapted to deal satisfac- 
torily with the situation. Capabilities acquired innately 
and developed by experience come into play. The situ- 
ation is handled as native and acquired aptitude has fit- 
ted us to deal with it. 

One who closely watches the behavior of another will 
tend to experience similar emotions and to perform simi- 
lar acts. When the expressive bodily acts characteristic 
of an emotion are observed, the emotion which they ex- 
press is aroused in the observer through sympathetic in- 
duction. 

Emotions are readily contagious by this process. Con- 
fidence and enthusiasm, manifested in the expression of 
the man making a suggestion, arouse like feelings in the 
mind of the man to whom the suggestion is directed. 
They assist very materially to give effectiveness to the 
suggestion. 

Certain emotions re-enforce readiness to accept sug- 
gestions. Hope, fear, jealousy, love, and admiration, 
favor acceptance of a suggestion along the line of the ac- 
tion to which the emotion impels. One can re-enforce 
suggestions by arousing such emotions. 

Through gregariousness, and instinctive interest in the 
behavior of others, the instinct of co-operation with oth- 
ers, and the instinct of self -subjection, men are predis- 
posed to submit to the volitional control of others. This 
volitional control is made effective through suggestion. 
The direct command and obedience to the command is 
an illustration. So also is the suggestion, by any other 



Suggestibility and Ability to Suggest 217 

means, that a line of action is desired and the compli- 
ance with the suggestion. In such suggestion the instinct 
of self-assertion is manifested in the one who makes the 
suggestion, while the instinct of self-subjection is mani- 
fested in the acceptance of and compliance with the sug- 
gestion. 

In the suggestion which aims to bring about in the one 
to whom it is made compliance with the will of the one 
who makes the suggestion, we have to consider the ap- 
peal and the compliance with the appeal, and the solici- 
tation and the response to the solicitation. 

Sympathetic induction of emotion and subconscious 
and spontaneous imitation of behavior are effective when 
there is no appeal which aims explicitly to secure voli- 
tional compliance on the part of the one experiencing 
the emotion or imitating the behavior. Sympathetic con- 
tagion of the emotion and imitation of the behavior of 
the one making the appeal also aid very materially to 
give effectiveness to the appeal. 

Suggestions which bring about unintentional imitation 
of behavior or sympathetic induction of emotion, are often 
conveyed by very subtle and intangible means. Among 
the more prominent of the factors involved are the tone 
of speaking, the bearing, the manners or tact, the im- 
pressive personality, the expression of the features, etc. 

If the one making the suggestion, or the appeal, is 
looked upon as having prestige or authority, that fact 
tends to bring about acceptance of the suggestion. The 
instinct of self -subjection is aroused. Attention is con- 
centrated on the suggestion. A state of increased sug- 



218 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

gestibility is induced. This state is aroused by those who 
make the impression of having power, wealth, great phy- 
sical strength, large size, social standing, etc. A similar 
effect is produced by a reputation for intellectual superi- 
ority, or for great skill in any line, or by the mere fact 
that one has excellent manners, or that fine clothes are 
worn. The inferior will readily imitate the superior even 
in trivial or unessential things. The imitation of an in- 
ferior by a superior tends to be rather of the subconscious 
sort, or to have a good reason to support it. 

Any thing giving the impression that the one making 
the appeal desires to promote the well-being of the one 
to whom it is made, tends to secure compliance with the 
suggestion. Anything which gives the impression that 
the one making the appeal aims to further his own selfish 
ends, leads the recipient of the suggestion to resent it 
and to refuse to carry it out. It arouses an impulse to 
contra-imitation. Instead of the instinct of self-subjec- 
tion, the instinct of self-assertion is aroused. 

Qualities of character which tend to promote well- 
being are called positive. The qualities which hinder 
well-being are called negative. The manifestation of 
positive qualities of character gives effectiveness to the 
appeal, and vice versa. 

To become effective in making suggestions, one should 
cultivate positive qualities of character. Positive quali- 
ties of character awaken positive self-feeling and arouse 
the instinct of self-assertion. They thus strengthen the 
power of suggestion. The fact that positive qualities are 



Suggestibility and Ability to Suggest 219 

manifested helps to bring about a favorable response to 
the suggestion. 

Certain things have been mentioned as factors which 
arouse the instinct of self -subjection or increase suggest- 
ibility. When the opposites of these factors are mani- 
fested they tend to arouse the instinct of self-assertion, 
and to decrease suggestibility. Hence one should elimi- 
nate negative qualities of character as they weaken his 
influence.* 



*See Chapter XXVIII. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

BELIEF AND TRUTH 

One believes that knowledge is true when he feels that 
it will enable him to adjust himself satisfactorily to that 
part of his environment to which the opinion applies. 
Belief is a matter of feeling. Truth is a matter of in- 
tellectual apprehension. It can be established only by 
an appeal to reason. Belief may spring from demon- 
strated truth, or from the processes which lead to fully 
reasoned choice, though one may continue to believe 
when these processes lead to conclusions with which the 
belief is inconsistent. 

Much in human conduct is the outcome of impulses 
and desires which are slightly, if at all, guided by rea- 
son. These predispositions have originated in the evolu- 
tionary process as a means of perpetuating and promot- 
ing the well-being of the individual and of the commun- 
ity to which he belongs. These predispositions have been 
developed, and beliefs have been acquired, by processes 
of suggestion and imitation in which reason has played 
a minor part. Hence, though beliefs may spring from 
strictly logical processes, they generally have their origin 
in processes of suggestion, or in a process in which sug- 
gestion and reason both play a part. This process is one 
of rational suggestion. How this process may be em- 
ployed to bring about belief and action will be discussed 
under "The Solicitation." 

220 



BELIEF AND TRUTH 221 

Prejudice is a tendency to judge and to act without 
giving due consideration to all the evidence. It is a 
pre-judgment. Such tendencies are acquired by accept- 
ing beliefs through suggestion. Much that goes by the 
name of education gains its acceptance or belief through 
the potency of suggestion, rather than because of ade- 
quately presented reasons, or experimental verification. 
Such beliefs can guide one safely through the mazes of 
experience, only so far as they have been put to the test 
of verification by others. 

A belief in regard to a thing prescribes a certain course 
of behavior in regard to it. In so far as beliefs guide one 
successfully in determining actions, they are true. When 
one can not deal with things in actual experience in the 
way or with the results the belief leads him to anticipate, 
the belief is, in so far, false. 

The truth of knowledge is hypothetical until it has 
been tested in experience. Active thinking in regard to 
a belief involves careful consideration, both of the 
grounds and premises on which it is based, and of the 
consequences which the belief involves in the way of 
other conclusions to which it leads. By this process an 
idea may pass from being a mere possibility to a fully 
reasoned probability which is regarded as having but 
little, if any, less certainty than a demonstrated truth. 

Active thinking in regard to a belief is undertaken 
only when something occurs to make it seem problematic. 
The function of thinking is to guide one through prob- 
lematic or perplexing situations. Problematic or puz- 
zling situations occur in our conscious processes when 



222 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

we become aware that belief must be held in suspense, 
pending investigation. The investigation aims to find a 
way to get around or through the difficulty. 

The solicitation will be understood more clearly after 
the discussion of "Demonstrated Truth" and "Fully Rea- 
soned Choice" which follows. 

DEMONSTRATED TRUTH 

Our opinion is true, if it enables us to adjust ourselves 
consistently and satisfactorily to that part of our environ- 
ment to which the opinion applies. By this we mean 
that an opinion is true, if it can be carried out without 
meeting with contradiction, or requiring modification, or 
correction, in practical dealings with the matter to which 
it applies. If we can assimilate an idea with the rest of 
our knowledge, if it fits in consistently with the rest of 
our experience, we call it true. By this we mean that 
we believe that it will stand the test of truth. We believe 
we can verify such an idea, or prove it valid, by apply- 
ing it to guide us satisfactorily through the mazes of 
experience, in solving the problems arising in our search 
for that which will satisfy our needs. The truth is that 
which will enable us to satisfactorily adjust means to se- 
cure the realization of our purposes or ends. 

If the claim that is made is true, the thing will work. 
If the claim is false, the thing will not work as it is 
claimed to work. In regard to a certain business proposi- 
tion, we can not at the same time make it on the whole, 
and in the same respect, both profitable and not profitable. 
The two ideas are mutually exclusive. If our opinion 



DEMONSTRATED TRUTH 223 

that it will be profitable fails of justification by subse- 
quent experience in working it out, it is not true. Ex- 
perience contradicts it. If our opinion that it will be 
profitable is verified by subsequent experience, it is true. 
It has been proven to be consistent with experience. Un- 
til an opinion is tested by a competent person, under veri- 
fiable conditions, in experience with the realities to which 
it applies, its truth is merely hypothetical or probable, ac- 
cording to the degree of consistency with which it fits in 
with verified experience. 

We can demonstrate the truth or falsity of many busi- 
ness propositions with which our knowledge and experi- 
ence fit us to deal. One could thus determine whether 
an adding machine would be profitable in his business 
by trying it out. But in many business matters, one has 
to act on a proposition without waiting for experience to 
answer his questions decisively. The demonstrated truth 
comes as hindsight, in cases where it is possible to gain 
it, while one must generally be guided by foresight. Here 
the ideal at which he strives must be fully reasoned 
choice. 

FULLY REASONED CHOICE 

When acting in accordance with this principle, we en- 
deavor to gather and consider all the evidence for and 
against the proposition. If the proposition fits in har- 
moniously and consistently with our previous knowledge 
and experience, we accept it as true. If it is inconsistent 
with our knowledge, or opposed to our experience we re- 
ject it. A choice made by this process is more likely to 



224 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

involve one in error, than one made by the process of 
demonstrated truth. One can rarely be absolutely sure 
that even the most carefully formed opinion will not re- 
quire modification, or correction, when tested in experi- 
ence. One who is to act in accordance with the princi- 
ples of demonstrated truth and fully reasoned choice 
must have the ability to do independent thinking. 

Independent thinking is an ideal toward which we 
should strive, but which we rarely attain. By such think- 
ing we should supplement the imitation and authority 
which play such a large part in our lives. One should in- 
vestigate matters with which he has to deal, should search 
widely for evidence, and make observations for himself. 
It is comparatively easy to find men who can follow di- 
rections; who can apply the ideas originated by others. 
The man who can grapple with the ever-rising problems 
in an original and effective way, is the one who will se- 
cure the important managerial and executive positions, 
who will handle big propositions of all sorts. 

In fitting himself to take the initiative in important 
tasks, one can not be independent of assistance from oth- 
ers. He should roam widely through the realms of 
thought and experience in search of suggestions. He 
should seize and devour mentally whatever he thinks he 
may require. One has clear right and title to whatever 
he can digest mentally, assimilate, and convert into new 
thought tissue. 

The mere marshaling of facts in logical array is not 
the most effective means of influencing conduct. To in- 
fluence action, facts must be presented in such a way that 



FULLY REASONED CHOICE 225 

they are seen to lead to something regarded as having 
worth or value. Desire and impulse to action must be 
aroused by bringing out clearly the things which give 
worth or value to the end toward which the desire and 
impulse impel. The impulse to action must also be re- 
enforced or strengthened by suggestion. 

It is mainly the suggestive influence that gives value 
to thrift and economy clubs, courses in personal effi- 
ciency, temperance propaganda, etc. The leaders in these 
movements are engaged very largely in telling people 
what they know already. At first glance it seems unbe- 
lieveable that results of great importance could be se- 
cured by merely rehashing long familiar things. 

The results are not gained through enlightening the 
intelligence. They come through stimulating dormant 
motives into action. 

For example, the literature on efficiency, the confer- 
ences, the records the individuals keep showing the use 
of time and of finances, hold the idea of efficiency before 
the mind. 

The efficient use of time, money and mental and phy- 
sical powers, become elements of an ideal. These ele- 
ments are vitalized through a consideration of conse- 
quences which gives a foretaste of the misery which will 
come from not following the ideal, and of the satisfac- 
tion which will come from seeking to realize it. One 
develops a habit of appraising suggestions to action to 
determine whether they promote the attainment of the 
ideal. 

In a club or class the spirit of striving for personal 



226 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

efficiency is contagious. The impulse toward efficiency 
is strengthened, as it is reflected from one to another. 
Emulation is aroused, rivalry, acquisitiveness, and the 
sociability impulses are stirred into activity. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

RATIONAL SUGGESTION AND RATIONAL IMITATION 

A rational suggestion is a suggestion supported by rea- 
soning, but not by a full consideration of all the grounds 
and premises on which the reasoning is based, or of all 
the consequences, in the way of conclusions, to which it 
leads. The acceptance of a rational suggestion leads to 
rational imitation. 

The solicitation is a form of rational suggestion which 
aims to secure, as a response, a form of rational imita- 
tion. After rational imitation has been discussed, some 
factors determining the form of response to the solicita- 
tion, and the solicitation will be considered briefly. 

RATIONAL IMITATION 

Many matters require experimental demonstration 
which we have neither the facilities nor skill to make. 
Many may be tested only by a practical application which 
it may be inconvenient for us to undertake. Many can 
be verified only in remote space or time, so that it is im- 
possible for us to undertake their verification. Some re- 
quire special knowledge or training which we do not 
possess. In such matters we must rely unquestionably 
and unqualifiedly on the authority of others. We must 
rely on the tests they have made, or the conclusions they 
have reached, which come to us as suggestions, our ac- 
ceptance of which is imitation of them. 

227 



228 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

The fact that the conclusions we accept through rational 
imitation are verifiable, or that we believe they have been 
verified by others, gives us confidence in them. We rely 
on those whom we believe to have special knowledge, 
skill, or ability, marked success, good judgment, unusual 
opportunity or advantage in getting at the truth. We 
accept them as recognized authorities. We are very 
likely to do so, if they give us a few plausible reasons 
to quote to others, in case our credulity is questioned. 
The supporting reasons make the thing seem reasonable. 

Our ideas in art, politics, religion, morality and educa- 
tion are unverifiable, or less easily verified than many 
others. Our ideas on these subjects must come to us 
largely through rational imitation. Even when we at- 
tempt to verify such things for ourselves, we get our fun- 
damental premises, methods of procedure, and standards 
of valuation through the imitation of others, as a result 
of accepting suggestions from them. We are often care- 
less and uncritical, or even not consciously active, in ac- 
cepting the authorities we thus imitate. We may, in this 
way, take up with either prejudice or wisdom, truth or 
falsehood, moral or immoral opinions. 

Rational suggestion may bring about the acceptance 
of ideas or opinions incapable of demonstration in experi- 
ence, or in spite of strong evidence to the contrary. 

The effectiveness of the suggestion in determining be- 
havior comes from the faith, or belief, or confidence, or 
conviction which results from fully accepting it, and is 
not greater or less than if the acceptance or conviction 
was brought about by adequately logical processes. 



RATIONAL IMITATION 229 

A suggested opinion will probably be rejected, if it is 
inconsistent with, or contradicts, previously accepted opin- 
ions brought to mind through association. Under such 
circumstances its acceptance would bring about a recast- 
ing of our previously accepted notions. In exceptional 
cases suggestion may even bring about such recasting. 

When the idea that one metal can be converted into 
another is first suggested to us it may be refused ac- 
ceptance on the ground that it is contradictory to ac- 
cepted opinions. But some one, who, we believe, knows 
what he is talking about, may tell us that certain chem- 
ists recognized as authorities have demonstrated such 
transmutation under experimental conditions, and that 
others have verified their observations. This may stag- 
ger us a little at first, so that we can neither accept it or 
reject it. Then suppose the person adds that radium has 
been observed actually to change into other elements. 
This bit of circumstantial detail clinches the whole mat- 
ter. Radium is beyond the range of the experience on 
the ground of which the suggestion was rejected. It is 
a wonderful element! Almost anything may be true in 
regard to radium! The acceptance of the suggestion 
might have been secured at first by mentioning the radium, 
but the underlying principles would not have been dif- 
ferent. 

We get our ideas in business, outside our special line, 
largely through this form of rational suggestion. This is 
true also in our own special line, to a greater extent than 
is generally suspected. 

If we are considering a proposition which may be 



230 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

either profitable or not profitable, we accept the alterna- 
tive that we can reconcile with the ideas bearing on its 
profitableness which come into mind through association 
of ideas and suggestion. If, by suggestion, the idea that it 
will be profitable can be made to take such full possession 
of the mind, that opposing ideas do not occur to us, we 
accept it as true that it will be profitable. A suggestion 
bolstered up with reasons why, is most effective in ac- 
complishing such a result. 

One must bear in mind that any opinion we accept, or 
act we perform, results from suggestion, and is imita- 
tive in character, if we have not deliberately considered 
all the available evidence for and against, and tested it 
by adequate and conclusive means, when such test is 
necessary. A little reflection will show most people that 
they have not done this in forming their opinions on most 
subjects which will come to mind. Most of our opinions 
and beliefs have been accepted on authority. We must 
depend very largely on suggestion to determine whom we 
shall accept as authorities. 

The general run of people reflect but little on their 
actions and beliefs. They do not critically consider or 
weigh the grounds of belief, or the ends, or motives from 
which they act, or the means they select to gain their 
ends. They are influenced largely by interests or im- 
pulses of instinctive origin, and by ideo-motor activity, 
to imitate the thoughts, feelings and actions occurring 
about them. 

Most consumers are influenced to purchase by their 
impulses, or their feelings of value. They do not discrimi- 



RATIONAL IMITATION 231 

natingly consider all the reasons for and against, and de- 
cide according to the weight of the evidence. Trained 
buyers and technical experts employ the deliberative 
method more fully, but they generally bring new proposi- 
tions under previously formed classes, and act accordingly. 
Everyone habitually trusts more to the results of previ- 
ous deliberative processes and past experience, than to 
present deliberation. We pretend to weigh the strength 
of the rivaling impulses aroused, or to compare the vari- 
ous means offered to satisfy our desires, but the evidence 
on which we decide is often present in mind in a woe- 
fully incomplete state. Deliberative processes are so ex- 
hausting that we rarely make them exhaustive of the evi- 
dence. Strong impulses, bolstered up by a few plausible 
reasons, and guided by skillfully directed suggestions, are 
usually sufficient to turn the scale. 

SUGGESTION OF AUTHORITY 

When one acts or accepts an opinion or belief as a re- 
sult of rational suggestion, it is often the case that he has 
been influenced to do so by some one whom he regards 
as a competent expert or authority. How does it happen 
that such suggestion so generally brings satisfactory re- 
sults ? The impulses which one follows have developed in 
the course of evolution and through social influences in 
his individual experience, for the purpose of thus guiding 
actions. In following such suggestions one is, to a large 
extent, allowing social agencies to guide his actions. He 
is following collective experience, intelligence and will. 

A picture is often used in an advertisement to suggest 



232 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

that the reasons why and suggestions contained in the 
advertisement come from a competent and reliable au- 
thority. See the "Psychology of Advertising." 



CHAPTER XXV 



SOLICITATION 



A suggestion, or a reason, is adapted to bring about 
an act, if it offers some means of satisfying an instinct 
or interest which will lead to the performance of the act. 

The solicitation is an endeavor to influence behavior 
by means of argument and suggestion. The solicitation 
aims to arouse desire and striving for the means of sat- 
isfying some interest, or to arouse aversion and striving 
away from that which hinders the satisfaction of interest. 

In the solicitation, one does not endeavor merely to 
satisfy the interest in knowing, or even to give pleasure, 
or pain. The solicitation endeavors to employ a process 
of reasoning to arouse impulses to action, and to 
strengthen these impulses by suggestion; or, perhaps, to 
re-enforce the impulse aroused by suggestion, by employ- 
ing a process of reasoning to arouse impulses tending to 
bring about behavior along the line of the suggestion. 

The following verbs are commonly employed to de- 
note processes of soliciting: persuade, induce, lead, in- 
fluence, move, encourage, prevail upon, incite, inspire, 
entice, allure, reform, coax, instigate, admonish, chide, 
reproach, menace, threaten, praise, commend, censure, 
blame, etc. 

A typical form of the solicitation, much employed in 
business, is discussed in the "Psychology of Salesman- 
ship." 

233 



234 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

factors determining response to solicitation 

Any state which prevents opposing or inhibiting ideas 
from being aroused through association tends to increase 
suggestibility. It is greatly heightened in hypnosis. Fa- 
tigue, sleepiness and ill health would thus tend to in- 
crease suggestibility along certain lines. However, they 
bring on a state of general inertia which makes it dif- 
ficult to influence one. The consciousness that one is 
not in a fit condition to deal satisfactorily with the situ- 
ation may arouse an impulse to contra-imitation, or to act 
in a way contrary to the one desired. 

Deficiency of knowledge in regard to the matters in- 
volved in responding to the solicitation, and lack of or- 
ganization of knowledge, are factors which prevent the 
reproduction of inhibiting ideas through association. 
Hence deficiency of knowledge, or lack of organized 
knowledge pertaining to the suggested matter, makes one 
more likely to be influenced by the suggestion. Stock in 
doubtful mining ventures is sold, not to experts in min- 
ing, but to those who know nothing about the business. 

For a similar reason one is inclined to act on an appeal 
along the line of a strong desire. Members of one party 
are inclined to accept, without requiring much evidence 
to support it, a story reflecting on the opposition party. 

Men are often influenced to believe that a thing will 
come to pass, by wishing to have it do so. When a sug- 
gestion is strong and coincides with inclination, one can 
often be induced to act on it by supplying him with a 
few reasons to bolster up his inclination. One does not 



RESPONSE TO SOLICITATION 235 

often go so thoroughly into reasons for and against, as 
to have unassailable grounds for his belief and action. 

The least suggestible man is the one who has a wide 
range of accurate, well organized knowledge pertaining 
to the subject suggested, and who habitually brings this 
knowledge to bear in critical consideration of the sug- 
gestions made to him. 

A state of self-satisfaction is opposed to suggestibility. 
A healthful, successful, contented man is not easily moved 
by solicitation. 

To make a suggestion most effective in securing a re- 
sponse, it is often necessary to repeat it, either in the same 
form, or in varied forms of expression. The orator must 
present the same thing from many points of view, and 
with different words, to carry his audience with him. 
For similar reasons advertising is conducted in protracted 
campaigns, and follow-up letters are used in series. A 
political party has a number of speakers in each locality 
during a campaign. 

The reasoning employed in a solicitation should not 
be put in such a form as to start an argument or debate. 
An impulse of self-assertion is aroused in a man who be- 
comes interested in upholding his side of a debate. 

Suggestions that fall in line with predispositions are 
welcomed freely when given in the direct form. Sugges- 
tions contrary to inclination are less likely to be opposed 
when offered in the partial disguise of the indirect form. 

Suggestion of reason why, by innuendo, or by insinu- 
ation, or by the various forms of figurative statement, is 
very potent in influencing men. In an underhand, in- 



236 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

direct way it gradually introduces into the mind things 
which would be strongly resented, if they were given as 
direct suggestions. The indirect suggestion often paves 
the way for a more direct or open statement. 

A man's reputation may be damaged by an apparently 
innocent remark, such as "I hear he is very fond of wo- 
men," or "His debts don't worry him." 

CORRECTIVE ADVICE. A FORM OF SOLICITATION 

One who has the management of men is likely to do 
more harm than good, if he merely condemns or blames, 
when things are not going right. His business is to make 
things go right. His aim should be, not to reprove by 
destructive criticism, but to improve by corrective and 
formative advice. 

The one to whom the advice is given must be in an 
attitude of mind which predisposes him to respond fav- 
orably to it, if it is to have the most salutary influence 
on his behavior. Such an attitude will result largely from 
an administrative policy which has created a feeling of 
confidence and good will for the one exercising the au- 
thority. Such confidence and good will spring from a 
recognition of the fact that the one exercising the ad- 
ministrative authority is really endeavoring to promote 
the best interests of those with whom he deals. 

It is often possible to do much in specifically paving the 
way for the acceptance of the corrective advice. This 
can be done by searching out something worthy of ap- 
proval in character, or in ambition, or past achievement. 
Find something worthy of commendation and praise it. 



CORRECTIVE ADVICE 237 

The opportunity for making future service more valuable 
should be brought clearly into mind. The ways and 
means of rendering this service should be explained. As- 
surance should be given that material appreciation and 
reward will be secured by more efficient service. Ambi- 
tion and loyalty can be appealed to. 

By such means a spirit of co-operation will be aroused. 
Desire to improve will be stimulated. Right action will 
be brought about by creating the right motive. On the 
other hand, mere condemnation, or a threat to fire, may 
arouse the instinct of self-assertion, and stimulate an im- 
pulse to refuse to comply with corrective advice given 
afterward. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

CREATING GOOD WIU, IN BUSINESS 

To create good will, establish conviction and belief 
that satisfactory service will be rendered to the customer, 
that the goods or service will prove to be in every re- 
spect as represented to be, and that all patrons will be 
treated with fairness and consideration. Good will is 
created to the extent that the patrons have learned by ex- 
perience to expect proper satisfaction to result from deal- 
ing with the concern. Good will is belief that service 
satisfactory to the interest of the patron will be rendered 
by the concern toward which the good will is directed. 
It is a favoring attitude on the part of the public, or a 
predisposition to be satisfied with the service rendered. 

Primarily, or fundamentally, this favoring attitude, or 
predisposition to experience satisfaction, must be founded 
on actually experienced satisfaction, which has resulted 
from dealing with the business, or on a direct knowledge 
or a belief that others have experienced such satisfaction. 
A business can build up good will only by giving satis- 
factory service, and by creating confidence that such ser- 
vice will continue. It can retain such good will only by 
continuing to give such service. 

Good will, to have tangible value, must be founded 
on the maintenance of a quality of service which justi- 
fies the favoring attitude of the people in whom the good 

238 



CREATING GOOD WILL 239 

will exists. The value of the good will varies with the 
number and character of the people favorably disposed 
to experience satisfaction with the service, and with their 
ability and tendency to spend the means necessary to se- 
cure the service. 

Good will may be increased by the satisfied customer. 
This is recognized in the common saying that the satis- 
fied customer is the best advertisement. Such a customer 
anticipates satisfaction to come from future dealings with 
the business, and by revealing his state of mind to his 
friends in conversation may lead them to anticipate a 
similar satisfaction from the transactions they may have 
with the business. 

Advertising, by promising satisfaction in a way that 
gives the reader assurance that he will find the service 
satisfactory in every way, will help to create good will. 
But good will can not be built up and maintained by ad- 
vertising, unless it is backed up by satisfactory service. 
Advertising can merely supplement proper service as a 
means of creating good will, it can not take the place 
of it.* 

In order that good will may be built up for a particular 
line, the goods must have some distinguishing feature, or 
trade mark, which will attract attention, and which may 
be easily remembered and recognized. The goods must 
have such quality that their merits will be firmly asso- 
ciated with the distinguishing feature, or trade mark, in 
the mind of the customer. Such association will be estab- 

*See "Creating Good Will" and Psychology of Advertis- 
ing." 



240 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

lished by actually purchasing and using the goods with 
satisfaction. One may be led through advertising to as- 
sociate the distinguishing feature or trade mark with the 
merit for which it stands. If the trade mark has a fea- 
ture which will suggest the value-giving qualities of the 
article, that characteristic of the trademark will in itself 
serve as a valuable means of advertising the article (Com- 
pare "Keen Kutter" tools). However, such a trade mark 
is very likely to be descriptive, so that it will be impos- 
sible to secure legal protection for it. Advertising the 
trade mark in such a case may merely build up business 
for unscrupulous competitors who will appropriate it, or 
imitate it. 

The property created by establishing good will is pure- 
ly psychological. It exists solely in the minds of the pub- 
lic in the form of knowledge about the thing, and of a 
predisposition or inclination to purchase it, and to experi- 
ence satisfaction in using it. It is a predisposition to ex- 
perience satisfaction which has developed from uniformly 
and repeatedly experiencing satisfaction. 

Good will for a meritorious article which has a dis- 
tinguishing feature or trade mark is readily transferable. 

Good will for the service rendered in supplying mer- 
chandise is not so readily transferable. It is attached 
partly to the representatives of the firm, partly to the 
firm. Such good will may be lost through the death or 
transfer of persons to other fields of action. 

Fixed habit of demand can not be established for arti- 
cles used only at rare intervals. The most valuable good 
will can be established for articles required for daily use. 



CREATING GOOD WILL 241 

The value of the good will depends upon the num- 
ber of actual and possible consumers, and on the value 
they place on the service, and on the fixity of the habit 
of using as determined by the length of time in use, on 
the difficulty possible competitors would encounter in 
entering the field, etc. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

TEMPERAMENTAL QUALITIES, DISPOSITION, AND 
CHARACTER 

Temperamental qualities and disposition are habits of 
responding to surrounding influences which are so gen- 
eral in their nature that they tend to influence and give 
their peculiar character to all conduct. Temperamental 
qualities have their origin in feeling, emotion and senti- 
ment. When these affective elements are aroused, im- 
pulses to activity accompany them. These affective and 
volitional tendencies have their origin in instinctive ten- 
dencies and are developed into habit through experience. 
The temperament and disposition thus developed consti- 
tute character. 

As temperament and disposition have been developed 
from native impulses through experience, some tenden- 
cies have been strengthened and others repressed. How- 
ever the native bent will color the final product. The 
natural pessimist may lose some of his pessimism, but 
will hardly become an optimist. It is doubtful whether 
adversity will ever make a pessimist out of one who has 
naturally a strongly optimistic tendency. 

From ancient times the various temperaments and dis- 
positions observed in men have been classified under four 
heads : the sanguine, the phlegmatic, the choleric, and the 
melancholic. 

242 



CHARACTER 243 

The sanguine person is optimistic, self-satisfied, im- 
pressionable or suggestible and sentimental. He is weak 
willed and changeable, broad in range of thought, but 
superficial and inclined to jump at conclusions. 

The choleric is quick in temper, intense in feeling, 
fanatical and suspicious. He has a strong will, is full 
of energy and is impatient of opposition. He is narrow 
in his range of thought and has his dominant interests in 
the objective world of practical affairs. 

Suggestion is most effective in influencing sanguine 
and choleric men. 

The phlegmatic is unemotional or apathetic, or well- 
balanced emotionally, even-tempered persistent, thinks 
before he acts and is intellectual in attitude. 

The melancholic is depressed in feeling, pessimistic, 
suspicious, brooding, irritable and obstinate. 

The four well-recognized differences in temperament 
and disposition may be combined to make the many dif- 
ferent characters manifested by men. 

As the mind's activities may be classified under the 
three headings, — will, feeling, and intellect, so the quali- 
ties of character may be arranged according to the vari- 
ous types of these activities. By rearranging the above 
qualities according to their psychological character, and 
adding a few others, we get the following classification 
which is more in accordance with modern psychology: 

Qualities of will : self-reliant or diffident, tractable or 
stubborn, positively or negatively suggestible, industri- 
ous or lacking in application, persevering or fitful in 



244 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

work, executive or directive, or looks to others for guid- 
ance, etc. 

Qualities of feeling: feelings easily aroused or apa- 
thetic, even tempered or easily provoked, bold or timid, 
strong or weak, generous or selfish, sympathetic or cold, 
conscientious or unscrupulous, cheerful, or morose, ideal- 
istic or materialistic, optimistic or pessimistic, broad or 
narrow in range of interests, etc. 

Qualities of intellect : superficial and quick, or slow, 
profound and quick, or slow, theoretical or practical, or- 
iginative and inventive, or receptive and reproductive, etc. 

Individuals may be classified into several distinct types 
according to the way in which they receive information 
imparted to them. 

One type of mind discriminates and grasps the super- 
ficial qualities or features of the elements presented to 
him, without perceiving to any considerable extent their 
significant interrelations or relations to previously ac- 
quired knowledge. 

A second type grasps the essential qualities and inter- 
connections of the matter presented to him, but does not 
perceive the significant relations between the presenta- 
tion and a well organized fund of previously acquired 
knowledge. 

A third type grasps the essential qualities and inter- 
connections of the presentation. He also brings these 
essential qualities and inter-connections into relation with 
a rich fund of associatively reproduced knowledge and 
experience which has been well organized. He appraises 
it in the light of past experience. 



CHARACTER 245 

A fourth type does not go through complicated intel- 
lectual processes but is influenced rather by immediately 
aroused feelings and impulses. 

Suggestion may be used effectively in influencing the 
first, second and fourth types. More cogent reasoning 
will be required to influence the third type. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

DEVELOPING CHARACTER AND PERSONALITY 
SUCCESS DEPENDS UPON CHARACTER 

The efficiency of a man in any line of business depends 
in large measure on the character he has formed. From 
his character come his strength and skill in influencing 
men and the respect he is able to inspire in the men with 
whom he comes in contact. The factors which are effec- 
tive in inspiring respect and confidence are traits of char- 
acter manifesting themselves, in subtle almost indescrib- 
able ways, in expression, words, tone, and acts. Through 
suggestion one's character impresses itself on others, 
whether he wishes it or not. Holding the good will of 
people with whom one does business depends largely 
upon the treatment accorded them. The treatment will 
be as the character is. The character can not be bad and 
the acts regularly good. Good character is manifested 
in habitually according the right treatment to others. 

Character grows out of the native tendencies and im- 
pulses, the instincts and interests which we have already 
discussed, as they are developed into habits by the ma- 
terial and social environment. The objects to which our 
native impulses attach themselves, and the form which 
their development takes, depends upon educational in- 
fluences, taking them in the broad sense which includes 
all external influences which affect our life. 

246 



DEVELOPING PERSONALITY 247 

A man stamps his true value on himself. Hence he 
must be what he wishes men to take him to be. No 
mask, or make-up, or attempt to play a part, will long 
prevent the inner man from expressing itself, through 
suggestion, on those with whom we deal. The world 
will take a man at the value he places on himself, pro- 
vided he is not trying to float a lot of watered stock. One 
should strive rigorously and unfalteringly to be and do 
the things he ought to be and do. 

Preparation for business efficiency consists in large 
part of developing character and personality. Psychol- 
ogy is merely a descriptive science. It is interested sole- 
ly in telling how the mind works, and how character is 
developed. As a science it has no concern to decide 
whether any particular habit is good or bad. To find out 
what traits of character are desirable we must consult 
the conscience of the individual, the experience of society, 
educational theory, ethics, and religion. In the last analy- 
sis it will be found that the so-called bad acts are ta- 
booed because they bring bad results. The good traits 
of character are so considered and esteemed because they 
further individual and social welfare. The best traits of 
character are the traits which make for the highest suc- 
cess. The traits which make for success are called posi- 
tive, while the traits which make for failure are called 
negative. 

Among the positive traits of character are : honesty, in- 
dustry, care of bodily well-being, cleanliness, persever- 
ance, thoroughness, punctuality, ambition, open-minded- 
ness, thinking for one's self, progressive spirit, leader- 



248 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

ship, ambition, confidence, courage, cheerfulness, opti- 
mism, self-control, temperance, truthfulness, obedience, 
courtesy, sympathy, civility, loyalty, etc. The reader can 
add to this list as he pleases. A little reflection will con- 
vince him that he would regard none of the virtues as 
traits or elements of character, unless they were habitu- 
ally manifested in conduct. 

To find the strong and weak points in one's character 
requires careful and honest self-criticism. Much will be 
revealed in the advice of friends, the criticism of enemies, 
the treatment one receives from business associates, and 
one's success in dealing with others. In forming his char- 
acter one should be guided by the ideal of self-realization 
previously discussed. He should aim at an harmonious 
development of character and efficiency in all lines, with 
special attention to the matters with which he is most 
concerned. 

Since a man's character is made up of native impulses 
developed into habits of thinking, feeling, and willing, 
the form that his character takes is to a large extent un- 
der his control. One can change his character by chang- 
ing his habits. To give up old habits and form new ones 
one must resolutely refuse to yield to the tendency to act 
in accordance with the old habit. Just as resolutely, and 
unhesitatingly and invariably he must improve every op- 
portunity to act along the line of the new habit he de- 
sires to form. This is so difficult that it is necessary to 
get the strongest possible hold on one's self at the start. 
But it grows much easier to act in the new way as time 
elapses and the habit gets better formed. The new way 



DEVELOPING PERSONALITY 249 

which at first required painful effort finally becomes 
pleasurable. It will finally require effort to act con- 
trary to the new habit. The most difficult thing in form- 
ing a new habit is to get strength and resolution enough 
to jerk one's self out of the old rut and get a good start 
in forming a new one. In time, the habits will become a 
second nature stronger than the original nature. Do 
not concern yourself with the undesirable habit you wish 
to eliminate from your character further than to refuse 
to give attention to the impulse to act along that line, or 
to allow the impulse to pass out into action. 

SELF-CONFIDENCE 

To make it clear how one can develop the more com- 
plex traits of character, and attitudes of mind, let us 
consider self-confidence which is of the utmost import- 
ance in every line of work. A firm spirit, manifested in 
confident and self-reliant attitude, and in decisive action, 
compels respectful and even considerate treatment from 
others. Show fear and you invite others to impose on 
you. There is much truth in the saying that men can 
win because they believe they can win. Energy in action 
follows naturally from self-confidence. To develop the 
self-confident feeling and bearing, decide carefully what 
you wish to do, and how to do it. Be thorough and pains- 
taking in your preparation. Keep your purpose in view. 
Be on the alert for new points of view, new ideas and 
new light on old ideas. You will thus acquire a fund of 
ideas and experience which will make you master of your 
line. Give yourself good reason to think well of your- 



250 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

self and then think well of yourself. You will thus de- 
velop self-confidence and initiative. Then do not stand 
around hesitating and irresolute. Go to work with an 
energy that never falters or turns aside. Where there is 
a will there is a way. 

Don't harbor feelings of doubt, or dwell on thoughts of 
inefficiency and failure. Most fears are groundless. Still 
more, are worse than useless. By dreading a thing you 
will be likely to contribute to bringing it to pass, and you 
will certainly increase its ill effects when it comes. 

Do not let your thoughts dwell on your shortcomings 
or chances of failure. A difficult situation, once squarely 
faced, loses most of its terror. Overcome any tendency 
to diffidence or self -distrust by keeping your thoughts 
fixed on what you have to do, not on yourself. Keep 
before you the advantage and satisfaction which will 
come from succeeding. Study your failures only to find 
out how you can increase your proficiency, and then for- 
get them. Think, instead, of future success. Suggest to 
yourself frequently "I am able to succeed. I will be self- 
confident. I will succeed." 

To impress your self-confidence on others, manifest 
in your work optimism, courage, confidence in your abil- 
ity to succeed, intense earnestness, enthusiasm and per- 
severance. Work without hesitation, in a thorough and 
honest manner. Avoid over-tension and convulsive effort, 
as they manifest weakness and involve waste of energy. 
Give the impression of having plenty of time to accom- 
plish your work. Appear confident of being able to han- 
dle the situation satisfactorily. 



SELF-CONFIDENCE 25 1 

If you wish to be a successful man, you must assume 
the mental attitude and manner and bearing of a suc- 
cessful man. The successful leader of men shows self- 
reliance and conscious power in his manner, conversa- 
tion, and carriage. He impresses men as believing in his 
abilty to do great things. Men have confidence in one 
who believes in his own ability. They distrust one who 
lacks confidence in his own powers to secure good re- 
sults. 

PERSONAL MAGNETISM 

This quality is so complex in its character as almost to 
defy analysis and explanation. The person who is de- 
scribed as possessed of magnetism will be found to mani- 
fest many of the following traits. He dresses tastefully 
in good clothes, well pressed, and cleaned, well kept shoes, 
and clean linen. He is well shaved and bathed and well 
groomed. He speaks distinctly with a pleasant and well 
modulated voice. His gestures and bearing are pleasing. 
He shows courtesy and politeness by doing what is gen- 
erally recognized as good form. Shows consideration for 
others, and interest in their welfare, and in what they do 
and say. He has tact and avoids over-familiarity and 
weak flattery. He is cheerful and cultivates the art of 
pleasing. He does the right thing, in the right way, and 
at the right time. He has easy confidence in himself, 
but is not conceited. He appears successful, shows mas- 
tery of his business and enthusiasm for it. At the same 
time he is interested in many other subjects, and well 
informed about them. 



252 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

leadership 

Prestige is an important factor in leadership. We have 
previously indicated the things which give prestige to a 
man. Personal magnetism, which we have just discussed, 
makes for strength in leadership. 

Success in leadership is attained through ability to de- 
termine what should be done, and ability to make one's 
suggestions effective in influencing men to do it. Attrac- 
tive personality, strength of character, complete faith in 
one's self, clearly manifested confidence and enthusiasm, 
and evident mastery of the situation make very potent 
suggestions of the subconscious sort on those with whom 
one deals. Coupled with these must be resolute, persist- 
ent, aggressiveness in overcoming obstacles and in coping 
with antagonism. 

Laziness is contagious by suggestion. So are enthu- 
siasm and energetic activity. An enthusiastic, energetic, 
efficient manager can inspire confidence and ambition 
throughout a large force of men. He will keep in touch 
with the efforts of each man, helping them with their 
difficulties and congratulating them on their successes. 
Sometimes a helpful spirit of emulation may be aroused 
by holding the achievements of the more successful up 
before the others. The successful leader can set free 
springs of energy in his men which they could not tap 
if working alone. 

EFFICIENCY AND SUCCESS 

Honesty, frugality and hard work contribute largely 



EFFICIENCY AND SUCCESS 253 

to business success. But they are not enough to insure 
unusual success. Natural ability must be developed into 
capability of employing material things and men advan- 
tageously as means for the attainment of business suc- 
cess. One must have vision as to a goal to be striven for, 
and ability to see where opportunity lies. 

The efficient business man must be able to recognize in 
other men the ability which makes for success. He must 
build up an organization composed of men who have the 
ability to see the end to be gained, and expert knowledge 
and skill, and the will to work in harmony to attain it. 
As long as a business depends on the continued activity 
of the man who created it, it is a one-man success, not 
a business success. 

The efficient man does not make the financial gain of 
business his final goal. He makes his business render 
service to others in due proportion to the profit he real- 
izes from it. While business success is an end, it is, as 
was pointed out before, a means to the realization of 
other ends. 

PERSONALITY, THE MANIFESTATION OF CHARACTER 

It is true that "as a man thinketh in his heart, so is 
he." A more important truth is "As a man thinketh in 
his heart so will he be." A right ideal truly visioned, and 
its attainment strongly desired, will awaken and stimu- 
late the development of latent or dormant capacity. Stead- 
fast adherence to the visioned purpose, manifested in ef- 
forts intelligently guided, will transform character, and 
personality which is the manifestation of character. To 



254 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

develop a forceful personality, apply yourself steadfast- 
ly to the formation of the underlying habits. 
" Whate'er you'd do or wish to be, begin it ; 
For boldness hath strength and power and magic in it." 
Prompt and vigorous action follow from clear insight, 
strong feeling, and the habit of acting promptly and vig- 
orously, when the decision is reached. 



CHAPTER XXIX 

HABIT AND ADAPTABILITY 

We become strongly attached to our old habits and re- 
sent anything which requires us to change them. Men 
who are supervising the work of others, or trying to in- 
fluence their actions, should realize this, and make allow- 
ance for it when new and improved ways of doing things 
are being introduced . Just as it takes effort to get a 
wagon out of the deeply worn ruts of a country road and 
to wear a new and smoother and better track, so it will 
require painful and painstaking effort for men to get 
themselves out of their old ruts of action and to acquire 
better habits of doing things. One circumstance which 
should console them in making the effort, is that the new 
habits when thoroughly acquired will, in turn, become 
pleasureable ways of acting. 

Habit always counsels to let well enough alone. To 
get a man out of such a rut one will have to show that 
the new way is so much better that it will pay to take it 
up. In doing this, one may at times have to fire some hot 
shot at the pestilential dry rot of habit, which is ever 
threatening to destroy the life of business. In any kind 
of business one is ever liable to get to running in a rut 
which will carry him far out of the line of progress. The 
times are constantly changing and we must change with 
them. One who does not grow and keep up with the 
times will ultimately fail. 

255 



256 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

As a natural result of the coming on of old age, the 
brain cells tend gradually to lose their plasticity or adapt- 
ability. This means that they are becoming unable to take 
on the modification in structure, or function, which is 
necessary in order to form new habits. As one grows in 
years there is great danger that he will grow still more 
rapidly in disinclination to form new habits. A man 
finally reaches a stage at which he can no longer adapt 
himself satisfactorily to the new ideas, or to the new ways 
of acting required by a changing environment. He can 
not develop the feeling of being at home in new social, 
business, or political surroundings. When one reaches 
this stage, he is entering upon old age, regardless of the 
wrinkles on his face, the gray hairs on his head, or the 
number of years he has lived. 

Is it possible for one to postpone this unwelcome loss 
of adaptability ? One is not old until he ceases to be able 
to think new thoughts and form new habits. One can do 
much to overcome the growing inertia of advancing years 
by striving ever to bring new ideas into his mind and 
to apply them in his business. One must not be content 
to live in the present or in retrospect. One who has kept 
his mind and character developing continuously, will find 
his capacity for development continuing. 

One ceases to live to the extent that he ceases grow- 
ing in mind and character. One who is content to rest on 
his oars, and drift with the current, will gradually lose 
his capacity to row upstream. The only one who can 
keep on growing is the one who has continued to grow. 
One who takes the progressive attitude and forms the 



HABIT AND ADAPTABILITY 257 

progressive habit will find that his capacity for growth 
and adaptation will persist far into what would other- 
wise be the declining years of life. 

Some men reach advanced old age in all lines com- 
paratively early in life. They are either foolishly satis- 
fied to consider that they have finished the course in the 
school of knowledge and experience, or they are unfor- 
tunate victims of arrested development. Some men stop 
developing in some lines, but continue to grow in others. 
In the lines in which they remain progressive they have 
early gotten rid of the idea that final truth or perfection 
can ever be attained. They have regarded their educa- 
tion as incomplete. They regard present knowledge, skill 
and belief, existing traditions, customs and institutions 
as still unperfected. They carefully preserve the good, 
but give it up for a better, when an improvement can be 
found. The test for an improvement is a more perfect 
fitness, or a new fitness to suit changed conditions. The 
wisest progressive is the really live progressive who is 
old in years. 

The man, who seems to draw from the inexhaustible 
spring of perennial youth, is the man who has maintained 
a habit of growing in wisdom and changing in attitude, 
along with the steadily changing current of events. The 
growing man is the man who keeps abreast of the times, 
or perhaps leads in the development of his own business. 
He has mastered lines of business activity closely related 
to his own. He thus has valuable and inexhaustible re- 
sources from which he can receive suggestions which will 
prove helpful in his special line of business. His mind is 



258 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

alert to the developments in many fields of knowledge. 
He has kept alive the optimistic spirit of youth, and mani- 
fests a helpful interest in the movements for social, poli- 
tical and civic betterment. 

As a result of the lessening plasticity or adaptability 
of the nervous system the acts of men have an inevitable 
tendency to follow the ruts of old habits. The growing 
power of habit on each generation, as its members ad- 
vance in age, is the force which makes for conservatism 
and checkmates unwise radicalism in business, social, and 
political matters. Traditional ways of thinking, and cus- 
tomary ways of doing, become venerated precedent. They 
come to be regarded as having moral sanction. The con- 
ventional is the respectable. Men grow to feel discom- 
fort in changing and hence to shrink from change. They 
come to dread and to try to prevent what would other- 
wise make for wise advancement. It is the arm that is 
stiffening with age that pulls back most fearsomely on 
the reins of progress. The predominance of men who are 
old, in the sense in which age is explained above, in 
managing any enterprise, will tend to develop conserva- 
tive policies. Long standing usage has prestige and sanc- 
tity in their regard. 

Habit and the conservatism, resulting from habit are 
the bulwark of the vested interests. The superior busi- 
ness and social position of those who direct these inter- 
ests gives prestige to the conservatism they foster, adds 
to its suggestive force, and tends to make the conserva- 
tism be regarded as good policy, and progressivism as 
dangerous. Proposed innovation, which comes without 



HABIT AND ADAPTABILITY 259 

such prestige, tends to be regarded as bad form and vul- 
gar. Our natural revolt from departing from familiar 
ways is strengthened by suggestion coming from the self- 
interested conservatism of the vested interests. 

PROGRESSIVISM AND CONSERVATISM 

The leader in progress in knowledge, in business prac- 
tice or in industrial skill is likely to be applauded. Here 
progress gives results whose value can be readily deter- 
mined. A very evident self-interest tends to keep men 
progressive along these lines. One who promotes prog- 
ress in general welfare is dealing with matters to which a 
proper valuation is less easily given. Innovations which 
would be really progressive and beneficial are hard to put 
through, unless properly accredited with the authority of 
the so-called superior classes. 

Progressivism has much resistance to overcome when 
it has to make its way against the opposition of the classes 
having superior social, political, and business standing. 
These classes are often accredited with a superior au- 
thority which they do not rightly possess. They may be 
biased by habit, by self-interest, and by party loyalty. 
Even when their influence is thus biased, it has great 
weight. It works in conjunction with the natural tend- 
ency of men to resist the discomfort and the feeling of 
adriftness which accompany the changing of habits and 
customs. Some men feel more shame in doing the un- 
conventional thing than they experience in doing the 
immoral thing. For similar reasons the leader in moral, 



260 Psychology for Business Efficiency 

>• 

social and political progress will meet with inevitable 
scorn, ridicule, and persecution. 



INDEX 



Acquisitiveness, 113 

Action and belief, 99 

Acts of will, 80; involving de- 
liberation, 86, 223 

Adaptability and habit, 255 

Advice, corrective, 236 

Aesthetic interest, 112, 138, 139 

Affection, 111 

Agriculture, instinctive inter- 
est in, 112 

Aims in life and efficiency, 90, 
100, 125, 130, 225 

Animals, instincts in, 110, 117, 
122 

Appeal and solicitation, 209 

Appeal, making effective, 58, 
172, 210 

Appetite, 111 

Approbation, desire for, 112 

Artistic interest, 112, 138, 139 

Association of mental processes, 
37; by contiguity, 37; by 
similarity, 41 ; processes of 
in education, 56; thinking 
depends upon, 57 

Attention, and interest, 67; 
and observation, 75, 80; vol- 
untary and spontaneous, 68; 
and feeling, 72; and sales- 
manship, 72; directs mental 



processes, 77, 90; expectant, 
80; focus and margin of, 80 

Athletics, 118, 146 

Auto-suggestion, 173 

Automatic and reflex acts, 108 

Beauty, 112, 138, 139 

Behavior, determined by men- 
tal processes, 10, 11, 24, 103; 
factors and processes of in- 
fluencing, 165-260; of others, 
interest in, 112, 114; typical 

. ways of influencing, 166 

Belief, and action, 199; and 
truth, 220 

Boom, 178, 202 

Brain, 17; activity and con- 
scious processes, 17, 26 

Business, function of, 9; is 
concerned with psychology, 
11; preparation required 
for, 11 

Cause, 153 

Character, 242 ; developing, 
246 ; success depends upon, 
246 ; types of, 242 

Choice, fully reasoned, 223 

Closing a sale, 74 

Clothes, 84 

Confidence in suggestion, 171, 
216 



261 



262 



INDEX 



Conscious processes, 17; and 
brain activity, 26; classifica- 
tion of, 24 

Consciousness, factors, quali- 
ties and constitution of, 102- 
164; functions of, 102 

Conservatism and progressiv- 
ism, 259 

Constellation of ideas, 58; in 
suggestion, 172 

Constructiveness, 112 

Contra imitation, 186, 218 

Conventions, 180 

Co-operation, instinct of, 112 

Corrective advice, 236 

Curiosity, 75, 112, 113, 138 

Custom and tradition, 202 

Deliberation, 86, 99 

Desire and aversion, 154 

Desire, 163; arousing, 155; 
arousing desire illustrated by 
salesmanship, 155 ; interest 
value and price and, 158 

Disapprobation, aversion to, 
112 

Disgust, 111 

Disposition, 242 

Dissipation and temperance, 
152 

Divine Spirit and Will, 131 

Education interest, 138 

Educational direction of in- 
stincts, 117 

Effect, 153 

Efficiency, and the aims in life, 
100; and success, 252 



Efficiency experts, 31 

Elation, 114 

Emotion, physiological effects 
of, 167 

Emulation, 111, 112 

Envy, 113 

Expectant attention warps ob- 
servation and judgment, 80 

Experimental method in psy- 
chology, 20 

Expert in thinking, 98 

Fads, 197; in shoes, 200 

Family and home interest, 136 

Fashion, a type of intentional 
imitation, 137, 181, 184 

Fear, 111, 112 

Feeling, 124; and attention, 71 

Fighting instinct, 111, 113, 119 

Foreword, 9 

Genius in thinking, 98 

Good will, creating, 38, 81, 238, 
246 

Gregariousness, 112, 114, 135, 
149 

Habit, 27; and adaptability, 
255; forming a new, 29; pla- 
teau in, 30; replacing old by 
new, 35 

Hate, 111, 112 

Health interest, 137 

Home and family interest, 136 

Hypnotism, 170, 204 

Idea, a process of thinking, 145 

Ideal of conduct, 100, 130 

Ideo-motor activity, 80 



INDEX 



263 



Imitation, 112, 115; fashion a 
type of intentional, 184; see 
also "suggestion" 

Impulse, control of, 85 

Impulsive acts, 84 

Inhibition, 83; retroactive, 45, 
49, 69 

Inquisitiveness, 112 

Instincts, 108; classes of, 124; 
definitions of, 109, 121 ; ele- 
ments of, 118; enumeration 
of, 111; function of, 112, 
117; modification of, 118; re- 
quire educational direction, 
117 

Intention, 153 

Intentional imitation, fashion a 
type of, 184; in tradition and 
custom, 202 

Interest, and attention, 66; and 
desire and aversion, 88, 153; 
controls process of thinking, 
92; in behavior of others, 
114; meanings of, 127; prac- 
tical and theoretical, 67; what 
is an?, 1,27 

Interests, are general notions, 
128; classification of, 132; 
correlation and co-ordination 
of, 149 

Interests, explanation of — aes- 
thetic, 138; education, 138; 
family and home, 136; health, 
137; philanthropy, 135; poli- 
tico-legal, 135; recreation, 



144; sociability, 137; voca- 
tion, 143; wealth, 139 

Introduction, 17 

Introspection, 19 

Jealousy, 111, 112 

Judgment and reasoning, 99 

Knowing, processes of, 24 

Leadership, 252 

Learning, most efficient method 
of, 61, 94; process of, 59 

Living, standard of, 160 

Loyalty, to group interests, 
112, 135 

Meaning or significance of 
things, 59; learning aims to 
grasp, 54, 56, 60; process of 
acquiring, 39 

Memorizing, art of, 52 

Memory, 44 

Mental and physiological pro- 
cesses, 17 

Mental constitution, 105, 121, 
213 

Mind, 18; of others, 21; soul 
and spirit, 22 

Modesty, 111 

Moral acts affect social well- 
being, 125, 129 

Moral interest, 125, 129, 132; 
principles, 134 

Morality the major interest, 
112, 129, 133 

Motion pictures, interest in, 
115, 116 

Motive, 129, 132, 153, 211, 225, 
237 



264 



INDEX 



Nomadism, 112, 114 

Normative interest, morality 
the, 112, 129, 131, 133 

Obligation, 133 

Observation, ordinarily inac- 
curate, 75 ; expectant atten- 
tion warps, 80 

Pain, 119, 128, 154, 168 

Panic, 178, 202 

Parenthood, 112, 114 

Personal magnetism, 251 

Personality a manifestation of 
character, 246, 253; develop- 
ing, 246 

Philanthropy interest, 135 

Physiological processes influ- 
enced by suggestion, 167 

Play instinct and recreation in- 
terest, 144 

Play and education, 145 ; and 
recreation, 112, 144, 146 

Pleasure, 71. 119, 128, 154, 168 

Politico-legal interest, 135 

Positive and negative qualities 
of character and suggestion, 
114, 210, 218, 247 

Predispositions, 108; enumera- 
tion of, 111 

Price, 158 

Proficiency, acquiring in a new 
line, 31 

Progressivism and conserva- 
tism, 259 

Psychology, definition of, 23 ; 
general, 23; individual, 24; 



social, 23 ; the science of be- 
havior, 103 

Pugnacity, 113, 119 

Purpose, 153 

Rapport, 207 

Rational suggestion and ra- 
tional imitation, 227 

Reasoning, 99 

Recreation interest, 146; and 
play instinct, 144 

Reflex and automatic acts, 108 

Religion, 112, 131 

Reproduction, instinct of, 112 

Respect for others, 112, 135 

Right, 133 

Rivalry, 111, 112 

Salesmanship, arousing desire 
in, 156; securing and holding 
attention in, 69, 72 

Secretiveness, 112, 113 

Self-abasement, 112 

Self-assertion, 111, 114, 217 

Self-confidence, creating, 249 

Self-display, 114 

Self-realization, ideal of, 124, 
132; predisposition to, 123 

Self-subjection, 135; in hypno- 
tism, 205; to appeal or soli- 
citation, 210, 217 

Service, 9, 11, 135, 140 

Sexual love, 111, 114 

Shoes, fads in, 200 

Shyness, 111 

Significance of things, learning 
aims to grasp, 39, 59, 60; in 
thinking, 88 



INDEX 



265 



Social being, man a, 125 

Social psychology, 23 

Social service and welfare 
work, 161 

Social well-being and moral 
acts, 129 

Sociability interest, 137 

Solicitation and appeal, 209 

Solicitation, factors determin- 
ing response to, 233 

Soul, spirit and mind, 22 

Spontaneous imitation, 180 

Standard of living, 160 

Subconscious induction, 176 

Subjective and objective realms 
19 

Subordination of self to su- 
periors, 112 

Suggestibility and ability to 
suggest, 213, 234 

Suggestion, 166; as a healing 
agent, 169; form of to be 
employed, 214, 235; in clos- 
ing a sale, 73; of authority, 
217, 231; rational, 221, 227; 
repetition of, 235 

Suggestive influence on physi- 
ological processes, 167 

Sympathy and imitation, 112, 
115, 116, 217 

Teasing, 111 

Temperamental qualities, dis- 
positon and character, 242 



Temperance and dissipation, 
152 

Tender emotion, 112, 114, 135 

Thinking and interest, 89 

Thinking ahead while talking, 
50, 58, 74 

Thinking, method of, 88; de- 
termined by purpose, 88; 
springs from learning, 94 

Tradition and custom, 202 

Trial and error in method of 
learning, 33 

Truth, belief and, 222; demon- 
strated, 222; test of, 96 

Value, 158; economic, 158, in- 
trinsic, 158; normal. 158; so- 
cial, 129, 158, 161 

Valuation, 127, 158 

Vital processes, 18 

Vocation a major interest, 151 

Vocation interest, 143 

Wealth interest, 139 

Welfare work and social ser- 
vice, 90, 126, 161 

Well-being, see "self-realiza- 
tion" 

Will, acts of, 80 

Will to live, 123 

Work and vocation, 140; and 
need for recreation, 143 

Wrong acts, 133 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Oct. 2004 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATfl 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



